12 Contestants Have Won $1 Million on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire
Over the course of more than 2,500 episodes spanning over 20 years, a total of 12 brave contestants have managed to answer all 15 questions correctly to win the top prize of $1 million on the American version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire.
Winning the million dollars is an exceptionally rare achievement, with some years going by without a single top prize winner. So these brilliant trivia experts deserve to be celebrated for pulling off this amazing intellectual and strategic feat under the bright lights and pressure of the televised game show setting.
Let‘s take a look at each of these stellar million dollar winners on Who Wants To Be a Millionaire and how they made quiz show history.
The Inaugural Million Dollar Winner – John Carpenter
The very first contestant to win the $1 million prize was John Carpenter, a 31-year-old IRS employee from Connecticut. He appeared on Who Wants To Be a Millionaire during its premiere episode on August 16, 1999.
Carpenter sailed through the first 14 questions without using a single lifeline. He finally used his Phone-A-Friend on the final question, calling his father just to tell him he was about to win the million dollars! Carpenter‘s calm confidence and trivia prowess made him the perfect contestant to christen the show‘s ultimate prize.
Fun fact: Carpenter famously did not submit his final answer in the form of a question as required. But the show gave him a pass due to the extraordinary circumstances!
Million Dollar Winner Breakdown by Year:
| Year | Number of Million Dollar Winners |
|---|---|
| 1999 | 1 |
| 2000 | 4 |
| 2001 | 3 |
| 2010 | 1 |
| 2014 | 1 |
| 2018 | 1 |
| 2019 | 2 |
| Total | 12 |
As we can see from the table above, the years 2000 and 2001 were a hot streak for million dollar winners, with several contestants cracking the game show code and walking away with seven figure paydays in quick succession.
Then things cooled off for quite a while, with nearly a decade passing between 2001 and 2010 without a single million dollar winner. But the 2010s saw a bit of a resurgence, with 5 winners in the latter half of the decade.
So why do we see clusters of winners in some years and then long dry spells in others? In my opinion, it relates to the lifecycle of any game show. In the first 1-2 years, the questions may be easier as the writers are still calibrating the difficulty. Then they make it harder to reduce big winners as the show matures. But after many years on air, writers have to come up with so many new questions that some reuse or unvetted questions of inconsistent difficulty sneak through, allowing contestants to make it through all 15. Just my two cents!
Now let‘s take a closer look at some of these amazing million dollar winners from various eras of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire:
Joe Trela (2000) – First Winner to Use the Audience Poll
The third contestant to win the million dollar prize was Joe Trela, who won on March 23, 2000. While previous winners John Carpenter and Dan Blonsky had navigated the questions mostly without any lifelines, Trela was the first to strategically utilize the "Ask the Audience" poll on the final question.
For the deciding question, Trela polled the audience and went with their answer. The audience was correct, making Trela $1 million richer! This set the precedent of using the audience lifeline as a strategic resource when in doubt on the final question.
Bob House (2000) – First Winner with Dramatic Save of Final Lifeline
Bob House won $1 million on June 13, 2000 in dramatic fashion. Like Trela, he also used the audience poll for the final question. But the audience was split 50/50!
With no help from the audience, House still wasn‘t sure. So he finally used his 50/50, which removed two wrong answers and left him with a 50/50 guess between the final two options. House made the right guess under pressure and won the million. Using two lifelines in quick succession on the last question added some theatrical flair to House‘s win.
Kim Hunt (2000) – First Female Million Dollar Winner
On July 6, 2000, Kim Hunt became the first woman to win the $1 million top prize. She was a contestant during a special week with celebrity contestants playing for charity, so Hunt won $1 million for the charity of her choice.
Hunt used the Phone-A-Friend for the final question, calling her friend John who provided the correct answer for the million dollar win. Ladies can play trivia too!
Kevin Olmstead (2001) – Won a Record $2.18 Million Jackpot
In April 2001, Who Wants To Be a Millionaire contestant Kevin Olmstead won a staggering $2.18 million. This stood as the biggest payout in American game show history for over a decade!
He was able to amass the huge jackpot by answering multiple questions with huge dollar values still on the game board late into the episode. The largest single question he answered was worth $1.6 million!
On the final question, Olmstead cleverly phoned Regis Philbin as his "Phone-A-Friend" knowing the host would not actually know the answer. But it allowed Olmstead to make jokey small talk before finally walking away with over $2 million!
Sam Murray (2010) – Ended Million Dollar Winning Drought
After Olmstead‘s win in 2001, there was a long drought without a top prize winner lasting nearly a decade. Finally on May 24, 2010, Sam Murray broke the dry spell by answering all 15 questions correctly and winning $1 million.
Fun fact: Murray wore an odd assortment of clothing picked out by his three sons for luck. He also chose to stop playing after the minimum dollar amount guaranteed prize of $100,000, but the producers convinced him to keep playing all the way up to the million.
Murray‘s win after such a long gap between million dollar winners was a breath of fresh air proving the top prize was still within reach with the right combination of skill and good fortune.
John Carpenter vs. Robert Slaven – Comparing 1st and Last Million Dollar Winners
It‘s interesting to compare the gameplay of John Carpenter, the very first million dollar winner from 1999, to Robert Slaven, the most recent winner from the current 2022 season.
While Carpenter did not use any lifelines until the very last question, Slaven used all his lifelines by the $100,000 question. This shows an evolution in gameplay strategy over the years, with contestants today more aggressively using lifelines to narrow down the answers starting early in the game.
Of course the basics remain the same – you need to be very smart, quick on your feet, and have luck on your side to walk away with the full million dollar prize. It requires a rare combination of intellect and test-taking skills.
So major kudos to all twelve brilliant trivia aces who managed to pull it off over the years and join the elite million dollar club! It‘s the ultimate badge of honor for fans of trivia games shows.