Ernie Withers, left, poses with Palmetto High School staff members after donating two automated external defibrillators (AEDs) to the Bradenton school.
‘A philanthropist at heart’
Bradenton man turns personal health crisis into lifesaving mission
While shagging flyballs during an event at Bradenton’s Pirate City, the spring training home of the Pittsburgh Pirates, Ernie Withers suffered a sudden cardiac arrest and collapsed on the field.
The team’s doctor performed CPR as Pirates players and others knelt in prayer. A trainer grabbed a nearby automated external defibrillator, or AED, and administered a jolt of electricity to Withers’ chest. Resuscitated, the retired auto industry executive was loaded into an ambulance where he suffered a second heart attack and paramedics again revived him.
A week later, Withers, ’76, Life Member and USF Sarasota-Manatee Campus Board member, was healthy enough to throw out the first pitch at a Pirates spring training game. He had four newly installed stents and a defibrillator-pacemaker in his chest, and a new purpose in life.
Every day since those events of February 2023, Withers has channeled his second chance into a mission to provide Manatee County organizations with equipment and training that might help save a life.
His Defibrillate Manatee Foundation has raised almost $200,000 from individuals, businesses and other charitable foundations, enough to provide 170 portable AEDs to public safety agencies and nonprofit organizations, including the Boys and Girls Clubs and Special Olympics.
Withers provides AED and CPR training to staff and board members of The Twig, a nonprofit serving foster children and their families. Defibrillate Manatee Foundation donated three AEDs to the organization.
“It’s so heartwarming that the local community saw what happened to me and how they responded,” Withers says. “You can’t really appreciate it unless you have a personal connection with someone who goes through what I went through. It’s incumbent for me to spread my message.”
The Palmetto Police Department received 40 AEDs to place in its patrol cars. “These lifesaving AEDs will always be just a few blocks away from someone who needs one in a crisis,” says Chief Scott Tyler.
Withers also donated three AEDs to the Pirates’ training staff for distribution to nonprofits in the Pittsburgh area.
In addition to the AEDs, which cost about $1,700 apiece, the Defibrillate Manatee Foundation has provided training AEDs, CPR mannequins and AED/CPR training sessions.
Withers is “a philanthropist at heart,” says Veronica Thames, CEO of the Manatee Community Foundation, which provides administrative support to Defibrillate Manatee Foundation.
“It’s said that philanthropy is not a matter of wealth, it’s a matter of character,” she says. “Ernie is a great example of that; making a life-threatening personal experience into a worthy cause to make our community a better place and gifting of his time, talent and treasure alike.”
- Marc Masferrer // University Communications
