John Ruddy with his cartoon character Manny Man. Photo: Donna McBride
A NATIONAL school teacher has achieved over three million views for his historical and geographical educational videos on YouTube. Since 2014, John D Ruddy (26) from Letterkenny has created many animated videos focussing mainly on historical events.
Each video is a six to nine-minute synopsis of historic events brought to life in humorous animation featuring Ruddy’s own character Manny Man, who he manages to morph into any historical figure with convincing accuracy and instant recognisability. Each video is voiced by Ruddy himself, who is also an accomplished actor.
His first video, The History of Ireland in 6 Minutes, quickly went global, gaining viewers in every corner of the world and instantly requests came flooding in from near and far to produce more videos.
Manny Man World War I.
Happy to oblige, Ruddy went on to expand his channel to include videos of The Conflicts of The North of Ireland, World War I, World War II, The Cold War, The French Revolution and The American War of Independence to name just a few. His channel now has achieved over three million views since it began in 2014.
This week his most popular video, World War I in 6 Minutes, has notched up over one million views in its own right. Steady on its heels is World War II in 7 Minutes, which has three quarters of a million hits and counting. Ruddy has been keen to expand his channel and last month, after he travelled the entire Wild Atlantic Way himself, he created a stunning fifteen minute video featuring some of his usual animation while also incorporating photography from the 2,500km scenic route. This video not only shows the beauty of the land and seascapes, but also features pockets of history and local information along the way. This video has gained almost seven hundred hits a day since it went live.
For full story don’t miss Friday’s print edition of the Donegal News