Personal Injury Attorneyin Sumter, SC.

“Wow!”

That’s what a Midlands woman said after she won the $375,000 grand prize on a scratch-off ticket, South Carolina Education Lottery officials said in a news release.

What turned out to be the six-figure winning scratch-off Mighty Jumbo Bucks game was sold for $10 at the Dixon Food Mart gas station/convenience store at 1290 North Kings Highway in Sumter.

The woman said she’s planning to use her newfound windfall to pay off her house, according to the release. She didn’t reveal any other plans for spending the money.

“I feel lucky every day now,” she said in the release.

The winner will be allowed to retain some privacy, as South Carolina is one of 11 states — along with Arizona, Delaware, Georgia, Kansas, Maryland, New Jersey, North Dakota, Ohio, Texas and Virginia — that allow lottery winners to remain anonymous.

The odds of winning the $375,000 top prize in the Mighty Jumbo Bucks game were 1-in-960,000, according to the release. Two of the game’s eight top prize-winning tickets remain unclaimed, according to the lottery website.

The Dixon Food Mart received a commission of $3,750 for selling the claimed ticket, according to the release.

This was the second six-figure winning scratch-off game that was recently sold in Sumter.

Earlier in February, a $300,000 winning lottery ticket was sold at the Corner Stop gas station/convenience store at 283 South Guignard Drive, officials said. That’s about 13 miles away from where the $375,000 winning scratcher was purchased.

In a breaking news situation, facts can be unclear and the situation may still be developing. The State is trying to get important information to the public as quickly and accurately as possible. This story will be updated as more information becomes available, and some information in this story may change as the facts become clearer. Refresh this page later for more updated information.

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e-VAC Magnetics, a manufacturer of rare earth permanent magnets in the Western Hemisphere, today announced it is establishing U.S. operations in South Carolina, building its first facility in Sumter County.

The project is expected to bring more than half a billion-dollar investment and create 300 new jobs for Sumter County, according to a news release from the South Carolina Department of Commerce.

“e-VAC is grateful for the support of the State of South Carolina, Governor Henry McMaster, Senator Lindsey Graham, and Representatives Jim Clyburn and Ralph Norman,” VAC Group CEO Erik Eschen said in the release. “We are excited to become a member of the Sumter County community. This project represents a significant commitment by VAC to re-shore critical process and product technology, creating good paying and highly skilled jobs for residents of the community. With this support, we will directly contribute to U.S. energy independence and national security.”

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The company will construct, own and operate a new facility on 85 acres in the Pocotaligo Industrial Park in Sumter County, according to the release. The facility will house production of permanent magnets for electric vehicles and defense applications.

e-VAC entered into an agreement with the U.S. Department of Defense, which will provide $94.1 million to acquire and install manufacturing equipment, operationalize technical infrastructure, and engineer production lines for the facility, the release stated.

Operations are expected to be online in late autumn 2025.

e-VAC is part of the VAC Group (VAC), a leading developer of magnetic materials and solutions. e-VAC produces rare earth neodymium-iron-boron (NdFeB) magnets, which are critical to automotive, defense, industrial and renewable energy applications. This facility and VAC’s decades of experience in rare earth magnet technology and process intellectual property represent a critical step to ensuring a resilient, U.S.-based supply chain.

Through the readySC program, South Carolina’s Technical College System will help e-VAC recruit and train potential employees. A website with hiring information will be available next year.

“The arrival of e-VAC Magnetics in Sumter County is a testament to our state’s booming economic growth and our commitment to fostering an environment that attracts business and opportunity,” Murrell Smith Jr., speaker of the South Carolina House of Representatives, said in the release. “With the addition of 300 new jobs in the region, e-VAC will be a welcome partner to the readySC program, our technical schools, and the larger community. South Carolina continues to be a leader in the advancing electric vehicle sector, and I could not be prouder to continue this trend in Sumter County.”

The S.C. Coordinating Council for Economic Development approved job development credits related to this project, according to the release. The council also awarded a $13 million Rural Infrastructure Fund grant to Sumter County to assist with the costs of land acquisition, site preparation, road improvements, water and wastewater improvements, and building construction related to this project. Sumter County was also awarded a $2 million LocateSC grant to offset costs associated with infrastructure improvements for the Pocotaligo Industrial Park that are needed for and will benefit e-VAC.

“More than half a billion-dollar investment and the creation of 300 well-compensated technical positions is significant for our community and certainly exemplifies our continued readiness and ability to foster growth in Sumter, South Carolina,” Sumter Development Board Chairman Greg A. Thompson said in the release. “We are excited about this new surge of opportunity for our residents and what it will mean for our community.”

SUMTER COUNTY, S.C. (WIS) - e-Vac Magnetics is choosing the Palmetto State to establish its first facility in the United States.

“e-VAC is grateful for the support of the State of South Carolina, Governor Henry McMaster, Senator Lindsey Graham, and Representatives Jim Clyburn and Ralph Norman. We are excited to become a member of the Sumter County community. This project represents a significant commitment by VAC to re-shore critical process and product technology, creating good-paying and highly skilled jobs for residents of the community. With this support, we will directly contribute to U.S. energy independence and national security,” said e-VAC Group Chief Executive Officer Dr. Erik Eschen.

On Wednesday, Governor Henry Mcmaster held a news conference where he revealed the plant that makes parts for electric vehicles, will be coming to Sumter County, creating 300 new jobs.

“South Carolina creates an environment of opportunity for e-VAC and Sumter County. The company has access to the tools and resources needed, like the readySC program, to cultivate a highly skilled workforce while creating 300 new jobs in the community. Congratulations, and welcome to our state’s business community,” said Secretary of Commerce Harry M. Lightsey, III.

The company will construct a new facility on 85 acres in the Pocotaligo Industrial Park.

During the press conference, McMaster said this testament to our state’s booming economic growth commitment to fostering an environment that attracts business and opportunity.

Officials said the project is expected to bring more than half a billion-dollar investment and will house the production of permanent magnets for electric vehicles and defense applications.

“I am elated to extend a sincere congratulations to e-VAC Magnetics for their impactful announcement today. More than half a billion-dollar investment and the creation of 300 well-compensated technical positions is significant for our community and certainly exemplifies our continued readiness and ability to foster growth in Sumter, South Carolina. We are excited about this new surge of opportunity for our residents and what it will mean for our community,” said Sumter Development Board Chairman Greg A. Thompson

A website with hiring information will be available next year.

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Public history student Stevie Malenowski spent his summer job surrounded by boxes of documents that had not seen the light of day in decades.

Years of furniture pamphlets, corporate memos and yellowing photos tell the story of Williams Furniture Company, a major employer in Sumter, South Carolina, from the 1920s through 2004. Malenowski’s task was to sort through the collection and scan some 1,200 items for digital preservation.

He was excited to learn from the specialists at University Libraries, who taught him standards for digitization and how to create a finding guide. He was less excited, though, to learn more about lumber.

“Honestly, the last thing I wanted to do was read more about wood products,” says Malenowski. “But the great thing about history is that the more you look into things, you see these characters start to emerge.”

Malenowski came to the project after taking a graduate class with history professor Jessica Elfenbein, who has been working to create a more complete historic record of forestry in South Carolina. In researching the industry in Sumter, known as part of the “wood basket of the world,” Elfenbein learned about the Williams Furniture Company archives at Sumter County Museum.

The museum loaned the archives to USC for digitization, and the collection is now available online through the South Carolina Digital Library.

“It’s amazing to think that all this history has been largely unknown until now,” Elfenbein says. “You’d never know that the ‘Williams’ in Williams-Brice Stadium is named for this furniture company in Sumter, or how the community there rallied to bring the factory to town. It was truly a community effort, and these are stories that are very important but little-known.”

Malenowski has also gone all-in on researching Williams and stayed on into the fall semester to complete the digitization project. He’s using the archives for his graduate thesis, which examines the impact of unionization on the culture of the Williams Furniture Company and the surrounding community.

“There’s so much to unpack in just this one area,” he says. “Having a union shop with an integrated workplace at this time was practically unheard of in the South, and it’s incredible how the union played a role in changing the social fabric of the town.”

Elfenbein hopes making the archives available will bring greater awareness of the far-reaching impact of this industry for the history of Sumter, South Carolina and beyond.

Last fall, Elfenbein taught an undergraduate honors course to feature the Williams collection. Lynn Robertson, longtime director of USC’s McKissick Museum, co-taught the course and led the class in creating a traveling exhibit that will debut later this year.

“All the students are from different academic backgrounds — business, science, the arts and, of course, a few history majors,” Robertson says. “What’s so great is that they all bring their own backgrounds, so they all look at it from different points of view.”

The course showed students just how relevant history can be as the students worked together to bring this untold history to the public for the first time.

In addition to creating exhibition displays, they worked in teams to conduct the first seven oral histories, which provide context for the archive materials and a different angle on the company’s story.

“Initially, I thought this class was completely unrelated to me, but I was wrong,” says Lauren Reasoner, an honors student in the College of Information and Communication. “Not only am I getting to professionally design the exhibit, but I also learned how to conduct oral histories, which turned out to be a crucial part of my senior thesis.”

Reasoner interviewed a Sumter resident whose grandfather sustained a devastating injury while working in Williams’ lumber yard, which shed new light on the company’s worker safety records. Other students talked with descendants of past owners and managers of Williams.

These interviews are now transcribed and housed in the Department of Oral History in University Libraries. Malenowski, along with another student, will continue the interviews this spring, thanks to grants from the College of Arts and Sciences Humanities Collaborative and USC’s Center for Integrative and Experiential Learning.

While the Williams collection is extensive, he says it offers an incomplete view of the company’s story without the perspectives of those who worked on the factory floor.

“The Williams collection is insightful, but it’s got such obvious blind spots. The workers are practically invisible, and you’d think the managers were the ones out there chopping down trees and building cabinets,” Malenowski says. “But we’ve finally gotten a list of people who want to share their stories.”

View the Williams collection online, or learn more about the Sumter County Museum. The exhibit will travel to locations throughout the state later this year. A comprehensive website, including content from the traveling exhibit, will launch in April.

Charlie Dubose has been collecting Christmas figurines and lights for almost five decades and sets up a big display every year for residents to drive by.

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SUMTER, S.C. — Sumter residents are lining up in their cars to drive by a Christmas display that’s been growing for nearly five decades.

“There's just something about Christmas lights. It come from when I was a little boy, the first time I ever plugged up a set of Christmas lights. When I plugged them lights up, it made me click as the fella says. It just lit me up,” lifetime Sumterite Charlie Dubose smiles. “It just thrills me to look at them.”

It’s why Dubose and his wife Susan have been collecting figurines and lights for 47 years, placing them outside his home.

“No matter what I do here, it’s coming from my heart,” Dubose shares. “That’s where it's coming from.”

Dubose says he starts setting up in September.

His display has been growing every year, covering his 10 acres and spreading Christmas cheer to residents who drive by and to Dubose’s neighbors like Ginny Miller.

“I mean, it's funny to watch the traffic coming in and out, in and out all the time.,” Miller details. “But it's alright.”

Miller says dealing with traffic near her home during the month of December is worth it to see the joy that Dubose spreads.

“Just everybody come by and enjoy,” Miller explains. “I mean it's a beautiful setup he has.”

“Some kids that come by here, when they see this,” Dubose says. “That is gonna be the only Christmas is what they see.”

Kids and adults can see the lights every night starting Thanksgiving.

On the weekends, there’s a special visitor.

Santa Claus comes to say hello to visitors and takes letters from them.

For Dubose, two things motivate him to bring back the display every holiday season.

“Giving them joy and telling them about Christ,” Dubose says. “That's the main thing: that Jesus loves them. That's what I tell them.”

You can see those lights from 5:30 to 9 p.m. every weekday at 115 Gaddy Ct. On weekends, they stay on until 10 p.m.