Sixty-one-year-old AT&T employee Gerard Chase of St. Louis said “retirement might come a little earlier,” thanks to a decision to stop at Mobil on the Run, 9950 Big Bend Blvd. in Crestwood, for gasoline and a Missouri Lottery Lotto ticket.

He purchased a $1 Quick Pick ticket for the Nov. 26 drawing and matched all six numbers drawn, bringing him a $2.4 million jackpot prize, according to a news release.

“Tuesday after the drawing, I heard on the morning news that the ticket was sold at the Mobil on the Run,” Chase explained in the release, referring to how he found out that he had won the jackpot while driving to work. “I exited. There’s a local store that I stop at in the morning. I stuck the ticket in the reader, and it came up $2.4 million!”

In a state of disbelief, Chase recalled thinking, “What do I do now?”

“I started shaking,” he revealed. “I got a cup of coffee, and then I immediately called my wife. I said, ‘I think I won the Lotto, and I’ll be coming home.'”

Before hanging up the phone, Rebecca, Chase’s wife of 24 years, exclaimed, “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

When Chase returned to his home, the couple rechecked the winning numbers at

to confirm that their ticket held the winning combination. After checking the numbers “a bunch of times,” Chase secured the ticket in a safety deposit box, while he and his wife “started the process of getting some information on what to do and when to do it.”

Chase joked that the most he’d ever won before hitting the Missouri Lotto was $30, so he wanted to take his time and “let it settle in, and get as much information as I thought we needed.”

As for plans for the prize money, he declared that aside from helping with retirement for him and his wife, who works as a caterer in St. Louis, the windfall will go toward their only child’s college tuition and student loans.

“We’re going to try to live our lives the way they are today, but obviously it’s going to be a little bit easier,” added Chase.

For selling the winning ticket, Mobil on the Run received a bonus check for $24,000 – equal to 1 percent of the advertised jackpot. Chase is the 327th Missouri Lottery-made millionaire.