£285,000 pools win for man who left home broke !!
By Norman luck

From his small Irish town Patrick O’Malley set out with 4s, 6d in his pocket to make his fortune in England.

Yesterday , 12 years later he was getting ready to go back ….. With a cheque for £284,877.
His days of scrimping and saving to support his wife and four children back in Co. Mayo ended with a 5s bet on Littlewoods pools.

Paddy aged 66, had picked up a 5s win four weeks ago and last week he netted another 6s.

“The biggest”

And with the luck of the Irish he did it again on Saturday when he got 21 points and the pools biggest win for four years.

It was his search for fortune that gave him the winning line.

He put a cross against every English town he had worked in during the years he spent trying to make enough money to return permanently to Westport,Co,Mayo and his wife.
Paddy a £14-a-week labourer, said after being handed the cheque by Eurovision song contest winner Dana at a London hotel: ” I don’t really know what to do with the money.
Everything I’ve got is bought and paid for. I don’t want for anything. I will look after my family and retire to Westport.”

“Reward”

It will be back to the tiny terraced home,for a luxurious new house doesn’t figure in his plans. But there will be no more gardening at £7-a-week at the local school which he quit to come to England.

Paddy, who lodges in Stag Lane, Edgware, Middlesex and works for a nearby carburetter firm ,added : “I plan to go back to work once more to pick up my pay packet”
His wife Nora aged 55 said at home in Westport: ” It is wonderful news. Patrick has worked all his life and now this is his reward.  When paddy was leaving last May to go back to England after a holiday he told me he would stay at home for good when he won the pools !!!”