Lavigueur family

The Lavigueur family is a Quebec family that made headlines in Canada in the 1980s after winning a lottery jackpot of $7,650,267 in 1986, which was then the largest prize ever given by Loto-Québec. [ [http://archives.cbc.ca/IDC-0-10-1632-11226-10/index_souvenirs/vie_societe/lavigueur Les Lavigueur gagnent le gros lot (TV report)] , Société Radio-Canada, March 29 1986.] The trials and troubles of the Lavigueur family have since become entrenched in Quebec popular culture for various reasons: the fact that a poor family became multimillionaires overnight, the intervention of a stranger who found the lottery ticket lost by the family's father, the judicial saga of one of the family's daughters, the only member of the family to not have participated in the purchase of the winning ticket, suing her father for a fraction of the jackpot, the subsequent family disputes that tore apart the family which dilapidated its fortune, all of which received wide coverage in the mainstream media of Quebec.

Jackpot

The Lavigueurs lived in Ville-Marie, a poor neighborhood of Montreal, Quebec. Jean-Guy Lavigueur had been unemployed for a year and a half after having worked for 34 years at United Bedding Company.

The father was raising his four children, Sylvie, Yve, Louise and Michel, with the help of his brother-in-law Jean-Marie Daudelin, since the death of the children's mother, Micheline Daudelin, who died of sudden cardiac arrest in 1983. The couple also had two girls who died in infancy from heart problems.

A few days before the draw, Jean-Guy Lavigueur lost his wallet, which was given back to him by a good Samaritan, 28-year-old William Murphy [Chris Gudgeon, Barbara Stewart, ’’Luck of the Draw : True-Life Tales of Lottery Winners and Losers’’, Arsenal Pulp Press, 2001.] , from Vancouver, British Columbia, who recently moved to Montreal, and himself unemployed. Murphy found the wallet and gave it back to Lavigueur, with a lottery ticket which he knew was the jackpot winner. When he got to the Lavigueur's house to give them back the unsigned winning ticket, it was the eldest son, Yve, who answered the door and refused to let him in, not understanding what he wanted. Murphy came back a second time to meet the father.

The new millionaires were Jean-Guy, Sylvie, Yve and Michel Lavigueur, Jean-Marie Daudelin, and William Murphy, with whom the family agreed to share the jackpot. In 1986, Louise Lavigueur, the only member of the family who did not take part in the purchase of the ticket, sued her father to get her share of the jackpot.

Family members

Two members of the Lavigueur family are still alive: Yve and Sylvie. Yve published a book in 2000 about the family's story and helped with the production of a 6-episode TV series which was broadcast by the SRC, the French-language branch of the CBC, in 2008. Sylvie chose to remain away from public life.

Louise Lavigueur died from heart failure in 1991 [ [http://www.cyberpresse.ca/article/20071213/CPARTS/71212193/-1/CPARTS Les Lavigueur n'étaient pas des « morons »] , Le Soleil, December 13 2007] , at age 22 [ [http://www.ledevoir.com/2007/12/13/168286.html Dramatique saga de la famille Lavigueur] , Le Devoir, December 13 2007.] . The father, Jean-Guy Lavigueur, died from respiratory problems on November 26 2000 [ [http://www.cbc.ca/news/story/2000/11/27/lavigueur001127.html Famous lottery winner dies] , CBC, November 27 2000.] [ [http://lcn.canoe.ca/infos/faitsdivers/archives/2000/11/20001127-072247.html L’ex-multimilllionaire Jean-Guy Lavigueur n’est plus] , LCN, November 27 2000.] .

Michel Lavigueur committed suicide on February 11 2004 [ [http://lcn.canoe.ca/infos/faitsdivers/archives/2004/02/20040213-081032.html L’un des Lavigueur s’enlève la vie] , LCN, February 13 2004.] [ [http://lcn.canoe.ca/infos/faitsdivers/archives/2004/05/20040522-130139.html Michel Lavigueur aurait eu peur d’être arrêté] , LCN, May 22 2004.] , at age 32.

Popular culture

Television

On December 31 1986, in a humorous year-end review, "Bye-bye 86", Radio-Canada broadcasts a sketch titled "Le bourgeois gentilhomme Lavigueur," inspired from Molière's "Le Bourgeois gentilhomme".

Comics

From 1986 to 1989, the humor magazine "Croc" published a monthly satirical comic titled "Les Ravibreur", which showed the newly famous family and depicted it as simple-minded, uneducated people. The physionomy of the main character was easily recognizable as a caricature of Jean-Guy Lavigueur.

Movies

From 1986, three Dutch movies ("Flodder", "Flodder in Amerika!", and "Flodder 3") have been translated in "joual" in Quebec and given the French titles "Les Lavigueur déménagent", "Les Lavigueur redéménagent" et "Les Lavigueur, le retour". However, these comedies had nothing to do with the real-life family or the events they lived.

Books on the Lavigueur

Yve Lavigueur published in 2000 the book "Les Lavigueur: leur véritable histoire" ("The Lavigueurs: the real story", ISBN 2-89035-341-9) at Éditions St-Martin. The book was used as a base for a TV series shot in 2007 and which was broadcast in 2008. [ [http://metropoint.metro.lu/20071213_Montreal.pdf La vérité une fois pour toute] , Métro, Montréal, December 13 2007, page 27.]

TV series

From January 8 2008, the SRC network broadcasted a 6-episode series titled "Les Lavigueur, la vraie histoire". [ [http://metropoint.metro.lu/20071213_Montreal.pdf Une combinaison gagnante] , Métro, Montréal, December 13 2007, page 27.] based on the book written by Yve Lavigueur. The series was directed by Sylvain Archambault, who also directed "Le négociateur".

External links

* [http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0091060/ "Flodder"] on Internet Movie Database

References