Tennessee Lottery
In June 2003, Governor Phil Bredesen signed the Tennessee lottery into law. However, tickets only went on sale on January 20, 2004. Once tickets were available for the TN Lottery, players rushed for a slice of the action, with more than $10 million in ticket sales on the very first day.
A mere three months later, the lottery added the Tennessee Powerball to its portfolio. This, along with the massive number of prizes being won meant that the TN Lottery games quickly became popular. On June 26, 2004, the Tennessee Education Lottery handed over the first million-dollar jackpot to a Knoxville player.
Today, the TN lottery offers 5 single state games, including Cash 3, Cash 4, Tennessee Cash, Daily Tennessee Jackpot, and Keno to go, along with Cash4Life, Lotto America, Powerball, and Mega Millions. Besides giving out large sums of money to winning players, the TN Lottery also gives to scholarships. Just four years after the first tickets went on sale, the state donated more than a billion dollars to its education system.
