LARGO, Fla. — To parents with younger kids, Jack Hartmann is a household name. The 71-year-old has written and recorded over 1,500 children’s music videos.
“I've always been fascinated and loved songwriting since way back when I was even a teenager,” said Hartmann.
He creates the videos in his studio in Largo. It is home to hundreds of props and costumes.
Hartmann, a retired social worker, and his wife Lisa started writing children’s music years before they ventured into posting their videos on YouTube. He says about six or seven years ago they did not know much about YouTube and now their views have been viewed one billion times.
“The number of people that we reach I guess is pretty big,” said Hartmann.
Hartmann’s catchy rhymes are not just a joy to children and parents, but to teachers all over the world who use his videos to teach students the basics of letters, numbers, spelling, and more.
“We love helping support education. Teachers work so hard and they have so many challenges to help kids learn as much as they can and they do such a great job in their work we just see what we do as an enhancement we help support it," he said.
Hartmann's YouTube views not only make him one of the top if not the top YouTuber in the Tampa Bay area. His videos now garner two million page views a day. Many of them are in classrooms with 15-20 students, reaching 30-40 million young children every day. However, Hartmann says the numbers mean nothing to him but rather the stories.
“We get comments, wonderful comments from emails and on our Facebook with responses of I have a class of autistic children and one particular one didn't even speak any words but he says the words in your song. He lights up and says the words in your song,” says Hartmann.
You can watch Hartmann’s YouTube videos here.
