Thom McKee

Thom McKee was a United States Navy officer who was a long-running contestant on "Tic Tac Dough", an American game show, in 1980. He set a number of game show records for the time, appearing on forty-six episodes of the series and winning $312,700 in cash and prizes. This total made him the biggest winner in the history of television game shows at the time.

Performance on "Tic Tac Dough"

As a contestant on "Tic Tac Dough", McKee won $312,700 in cash and prizes over forty-six days on the show. He played a total of eighty-nine games, answering 353 trivia questions correctly. His total prizes included eight cars (as five-day winners on "Tic Tac Dough" were awarded a new car every fifth win), three sailboats, sixteen vacations (which he was unable to take), several other smaller prizes, and $200,000 in cash. Prior to McKee's record, the most ever won on a television game show was "The Joker's Wild" contestant Eileen Jason, who won $305,280 ($250,000 of which was won during the 1979 Tournament of Champions).Fact|date=September 2008

McKee was defeated by Erik Kraepelien to end his winning streak. After his defeat, McKee appeared on "To Tell the Truth" in 1980. Only one of the four celebrity panelists was able to identify him among his two impostors. In the 1990s, he became president of Hicks & Rotner Associates Inc. (now H&R Retail), a brokerage firm. [cite web |url=http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-784171.html |title=See more articles from Former Highflier Now Piloting a Retail Brokerage |accessdate=2008-09-22 |last=Presler |first=Margaret Webb |date=1996-04-08 |work=The Washington Post] He is no longer with the firm.

Records broken

The wins and consecutive days records were broken by "100%" contestant Ian Lygo in 1998, while the winnings record was broken by Michael Shutterly during the original 15-night run of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" in 1999, where he won $500,000. McKee still holds the record for most consecutive games played, due to the nature of Tic Tac Dough making ties possible (and frequent). However, "Jeopardy!" contestant Ken Jennings (who himself set a new cash winnings record), beat the wins record with 74, and most consecutive days with 75 in 2004-2005.cite web |url=http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200501/slenske |title=Trivial Pursuits |accessdate=2008-08-22 |last=Slenske |first=Michael |work=The List]

McKee participated in the American version of "Grand Slam" as the #11 seed, facing a field of game show greats. He faced John Carpenter of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire" fame in a first-round matchup, but lost.

References