Burl Sizemore

What this channel sells has not been checked yet.

Niche

Old Appalachian ways, tools and mountain life, 1930s–1960s

Audience

Older, mainly American viewers with roots in or nostalgia for rural Appalachia who like pocket knives, hand tools, old household know-how and survival lore (inferred from titles, descriptions and the about text, which addresses people who carry something their grandfather would recognize).

Avatar

• Realistic avatar
• A photorealistic elderly man with a long white beard, camo cap or felt hat, plaid flannel shirt and denim or canvas overalls, placed in a new rural scene in each thumbnail: cabin porch, snowy yard, store counter, laurel thicket.

Format

One long first-person monologue per video: a dated boyhood anecdote from the holler opens, then a numbered run of old tools, habits or house features (often 'outlawed' or vanished), each tied back to named family members.

Typical length

Since September 35–53 min; August uploads ran 10–25 min

Content pillars

• Outlawed or forgotten tools and knives
• Vanished Appalachian home and house features
• Depression-era and winter survival know-how
• Childhood rules and family life in the holler
• Camping, woodcraft and survival myths

Title patterns

• [N] "Outlawed" [Tools/Lessons] Every Appalachian Grandpa [Knew/Hid in His Barn Loft] (I [Still Use/Quit] [N])
• [N] STRANGE Appalachian [X] Features That Have [Disappeared/Vanished] ([Twist])
• An Appalachian Boy Did [N] Things Before [Age] That Are Illegal Now ([N] Are Still With Me)
• What Every Appalachian Grandfather [Kept Under His Bed] ([We Were Never Allowed to Touch It])
• Every Appalachian [Boy/Family] Knew [N] [X] ([One of Them Was a Lie])

Thumbnails

A photorealistic scene still of the bearded persona in overalls, to one side or centred, holding or beside the video's object in warm golden or lamp light, with a 2–4 word all-caps caption in white, yellow, red or cyan ('HE NEVER SWUNG IT', 'THE HOUSE WORKED').

Their thumbnails, most viewed first

• 
  18.7K views (opens on YouTube in a new tab)
• 
  9.91K views (opens on YouTube in a new tab)
• 
  9.15K views (opens on YouTube in a new tab)

Why it works

• 27 of the 30 latest titles end in a first-person parenthetical twist ('I Still Use Two', 'I Burned Four'), and all 30 name Appalachia
• A numbered-list promise in 21 of the 30 latest titles; the most viewed video, a 32-item list, has 122,319 views
• An 'outlawed', 'illegal' or 'law' angle in 5 of the 10 most viewed titles, including the second (84,810 views)
• A detailed persona backstory (born 1954, eastern Kentucky, named grandparents and cousins) in the about text and the opening anecdote of the descriptions
• High output of long videos, about 8 a week; 606,648 of 780,533 all-time views and 3,464 of 4,190 subscribers came in the last 30 days

• StoreThe Manualburlsizemore.com · About page · 30 of the last 30 descriptions (opens in a new tab)

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• Vaulted Solutions100 subs · Forgotten vintage home, kitchen and homestead tricks (1930s-1960s)