'Wheel of Fortune' Million Goes to Middle School Teacher From Virginia (VIDEO)
A "Wheel of Fortune" million went to a middle school teacher from northern Virginia in May on an episode of the popular game show that aired Wednesday. Sarah Manchester, 42, became the third person in the show's history to win the million-dollar prize, which was added to the game in 2008.
The new "Wheel of Fortune" millionaire works at Tacoma Park Middle School teaching arithmetic, and she was fortunate enough to be selected for the game show's "Teachers Week." Manchester, who is from Silver Spring, Maryland, didn't think she would be selected at first, so she sat on the ground and graded papers while "Wheel of Fortune" staff pulled out random names.
"I figured if my name wasn't pulled, at least I was getting my work done," she told The Washington Post.
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After two rounds of auditions, she managed to make it on the game show. The game was close, with only $6,000 between third place and first place. First Manchester managed to solve the Prize Puzzle and won a trip to the Dominican Republic. From there, she managed to guess the Toss Up Puzzle — the answer was "the Pacific Ocean" — with only several letters revealed.
When the Bonus Round finally came around, Manchester was so focused on winning that she didn't remember that "Wheel of Fortune" had added a million-dollar prize to the game show in 2008.
"Oh I forgot!" she said at the time.
The Bonus Round puzzle Manchester again managed to guess with little effort: "Loud Laughter" was the answer.
"I saw it right away, so I called the letter and was able to solve pretty easily," she said.
Manchester's father, husband and children were at the taping to see her walk away with $1,017,490 and a vacation. Pat Sajak then asked the math teacher if she had calculated the probability of her winning a million dollars.
"I assessed that the probably was low, but even unlikely events sometimes happen!" she replied.
Manchester plans to use her new winnings to take her family on a vacation to France — her daughter was heading there with her school chorus, but now the entire family can afford to go — and to donate some of it to charity.
Right now she says she's "soaking in every minute" of being the third million-dollar winner on "Wheel of Fortune."
