HARTWICK SEMINARY- Ron DelRosario walked into the P&C, here, on July 21 to buy a loaf of bread and 10 quick pick Lotto tickets.

On Monday, he was presented with some major bread, $1,489,746 to be exact, after one of the Lotto tickets he purchased was the only winner in the $3 million Lotto drawing of July 21. DelRosario, of Staten Island, chose the lump sum payment rather than 26 yearly installments.

At a news conference held inside the P&C on Monday morning, DelRosario, 61, said he has been playing Lotto since it first begin (in 1967) and his previous big winner was $10,000 on a Pick 4 ticket.

"Oh yeah, I play all the time," DelRosario, a retired New York City sanitation worker, said.

Asked if he would keep on playing in the future, he said "Sure, you never know, I might get hit by lightning twice."

DelRosario was in the area visiting his sister, Doreen DelRosario of Cooperstown, and her husband. He plans to split half of the winnings with his ex-wife, Lorraine Paolucci of New Smyrna Beach, Fla, and said on Monday he hadn't told his sister yet about his winnings.

"I want to surprise her by letting her read it in the newspaper," he said.

On Tuesday afternoon, Doreen DelRosario, an oncology nurse at Bassett Hospital, said she found out her brother had won that morning when she called in a prescription to Cooperstown from the Herkimer office.

"They asked me if I had read the paper yet (Daily Star) and I said no, and they told me 'Your brother won the lottery,"" Doreen said. "I spoke to Ron Sunday night and he said he was thinking of coming up, but he never mentioned a thing."

Doreen said she called and left a message for her brother but hadn't spoken to him yet.

" I think it's great, he worked two jobs most of his life to support his kids and he's a big softie," she said. "I want to tell him to buy himself a new car."

Ron DelRosario explained that his ex-wife actually asked him to buy the winning ticket. He gave it to her on a Wednesday, and she called him two days later to tell him they had won.

"We had a deal where I bought the Lotto in New York, and she'd buy in Florida, and we always said if we ever won, we'd split it," he said. "She's good, she didn't have to split it with me. Actually, after this, she's great."

DelRosario is the father of three and also has seven grandchildren. He said he plans to buy a summer home in Cooperstown, do some traveling and "help out the grandkids."

DelRosario is the first person with a winning Lotto ticket in Otsego County history, according to Lotto spokesperson Carolyn Hapeman. The winning numbers were 8, 22, 25, 28, 36 and 56.