By Monsignor Noel C. Burtenshaw (First In A Series)

If you were born in Brattleboro, Vermont and someone told you that one day you would stand on a mound in a packed stadium, wiping your brow with your sleeve, nervously squeezing an unyielding baseball and waiting for the next batter, what would you say?

If they went further and said your opponents would be the dreaded Yankees and you would be playing them in a World Series, what then?

If they said you would face a Mickey Mantle, Yogi Barra, Whitey Ford and Tony Cubeck, that the Series would go seven games and your team would win 4-3, how would you react?

Most probably you would thank your audience for the nice dream and leave it at that. Well, that dream of a lifetime came true for a kid whose voice is well-known across the Southeast.

He is Ernest Thorwald Johnson and he is the voice of the Atlanta Braves, and their director of broadcasting.

When you ask the youthful, happy-go-lucky Ernie Johnson his age, he says he is the “speed limit,” meaning he was born in 1924. His father and mother came by separate boats from Sweden, met and married in Vermont and that’s where Ernie grew up “sports mad.”

Basketball was Ernie’s first love and he was determined that the Boston Celtics would be hearing from him. His high school coach took him to Boston, but not to see the Celtics. They called on the Red Sox and the Braves major league baseball teams. The Braves not only showed an interest in the breaking ball pitcher but signed him to a contract.

Ernie was ready that year of 1942 for the Big Leagues, but Uncle Sam had other ideas and another uniform in mind. Ernie joined the elite aviators of the Marine Corps and went island hopping in the Pacific. He’s still a typical Marine. “They were a great bunch,” says the ex-staff sergeant, “and we still look forward to our reunions.”

1946 saw Ernie back on the mound pitching in the Minor Leagues. He made the Majors for the Boston Braves in 1950 and ‘52. Then Boston moved on to Milwaukee and the golden years of Ernie Johnson’s pitching career bloomed. “We had a great team,” says the broadcaster dreamily, “Eddie Matthews, Warren Spahn, Henry Aaron, Lew Burdette - they were sensational and led us into that thrill of a lifetime World Series in 1957. Burdett was great on the Mound, even if a little ‘grease’ showed up here and there on the ball.”

But Ernie’s most memorable game was not the Series but a game he pitched against the Brooklyn Dodgers in Ebbetts Field in 1955.

“For 8 1/2 innings I shut them out, and the papers made a thing about it because I told them my mind wasn’t really on the game. It was with my daughter who was making her First Communion that same day. I sure wished I could have been with her.”

Mostly a relief pitcher, as the baseball career of Ernie Johnson ended, his record stood at 40 wins and 21 losses.

In 1960, it seemed that Ernie was leaving his beloved baseball forever. “I had a little life insurance business going,” he said thinking back, “and I felt my destiny lay in that direction. But I got a call from a local producer in Milwaukee who had a half hour weekly program on baseball called ‘Play Ball.’ I was reluctant to get into the broadcasting end, but decided to give it a shot.”

Luckily for the industry, Ernie did audition for “Play Ball.” A whole new career opened up to the former Braves’ reliever.

“The best advise I ever got about broadcasting,” remembers Ernie, “was from Joe Garagiola. I did a show with Joe who is just a super guy to interview and afterwards he said, let me give you a small piece of advise - be yourself, that’s all - be yourself.”

It must have been exactly what the neophyte broadcaster needed. John McHale of the Braves saw Ernie in action and the soon to be Atlanta Braves had a new “voice.”

Ernie Johnson became a convert to the faith in 1961, after he had left baseball. “I often wish I had converted earlier,” says Ernie with a grin, “it might have helped a few of those wild pitches I threw.” He stays in touch with the priest who instructed him, Father Joe Derks in Milwaukee. “God has always played a big part in my life,” says Ernie. “Look at the wonderful life and gifts he has given me, my baseball career and all those splendid memories. And my voice. He has made it acceptable and it has opened up a job for me that I love.”

Ernie and his wife of 32 years, Lois, live in Roswell and are parishioners of St. Thomas Aquinas parish in Alpharetta. They have three children, two girls and Ernie, Jr. who will soon take up his new duties as a news anchorman in Macon.

One last question of this Sporting Georgia Catholic. Who was the most difficult batter he ever pitched to? The names go through his mind - Mays, Mantle, Yogi? “Naw it was Stan,” recalls Ernie definitely, “yeah, Musial was the best.”