This is one in an occasional series on Iowa influencers who are finding new ways to tell the story of the state through social media.
Kaleb Wyse isn’t a farmer.
So, when he shares his life on Knollgate Farm in eastern Iowa with hundreds of thousands of people online, it isn’t from the perspective of a man tending to acres of soybeans and corn in Iowa.
It’s from a person who deeply cares for the land he lives on, land farmed by three previous generations of men on his paternal side. And from someone whose passions for gardening and cooking — the kind of content you’ll find on — are rooted in his experiences on a family farm.
Documenting his work around the farm — canning peaches, planting hydrangeas and testing plenty of holiday recipes — the Mount Pleasant content creator offers insights to his social media followers. Some will take inspiration and apply it to their own lives, wherever they live.
Or, at least smile, he said.
You can take a kid out of the farm, but you can’t take the farm out of the kid
From farm chores to canning, life on a family farm meant Wyse was accustomed to loved ones always being around.
Wyse sought stories from his grandparents, stories that allowed him to feel connected to the generations that came before him.
“Those stories are part of that connection and understanding how things used to be, but also I think is what affected my love for the farm and the land and knowing the work, the sweat, the hard labor that my family had put into it years before me even,” he said. “This used to be a more normal thing years ago, but just with the idea of being able to pass it on to the next person, it’s kind of like that living legacy and I think that was really felt as I was growing up without being told.”
Wyse’s connection to the farm, the land, never faltered. He was adamant he’d return home even though he knew he wasn’t going to be a farmer. In fact, he pursued business and accounting in college. The latter “sounded good.”
“When you grow up on a farm, I think my grandparents too felt like, farm work was always maybe not the professional work and I think they probably, working so hard, felt like they wanted for all their grandkids these wonderful professional things,” Wyse said.
The connection to his home grew when Wyse’s father died — a man who was devoted to the farm. Wyse could still feel him there.
When the opportunity to purchase his grandparents’ home arose, he took it.
Discovering what works with the Wyse Guide audience, and himself
And yet, life wasn’t quite falling into place.
Feeling the need to pursue something more fulfilling — day jobs weren’t cutting it — Wyse and Joel Kratzer, a college friend with a shared interest in making content about homemaking, launched the first iteration of Wyse Guide in 2012. Their original idea had a different name.
Though Wyse didn’t really know how to do any of this blogging stuff, he wanted to try. In some ways, it was almost like starting a business, but there was no risk — except for maybe embarrassment, he said.
For some six or seven years, Wyse and Kratzer kept at it with a blog that took a lot of time and never really hit its stride.
Wyse reached a decision.
He was going to stop caring about what others may think if they saw Wyse Guide. He was going to stop making content that he thought people would like.
Instead, he was going to focus on sharing what he knew from the farm.
“Growing up on a farm — and this (was) just what I was told from even, somewhat, family — the food we make is just normal food or the things we do, you never felt like it was something special, the way I grew up,” Wyse said.
His accounts started gaining followers around 2019 and Wyse began building connections with them. For some, it was a sense of nostalgia. For others, it was seeing something they didn’t get the chance to grow up with.
“Or they felt like it was lost in their life like, “Oh, my grandma did that. And now I forgot all about it but now you’re showing me how to do that again,'” he said.
The coronavirus pandemic only furthered the appeal of Wyse’s content for several reasons. Viewers could live vicariously through Wyse and all the open space he had while many were stuck in crowded homes. Those at home pursued new hobbies with newfound free time and could connect with the activities Wyse was sharing.
Those years of being unhappy in his career led to Wyse better understanding what drives him.
“I think that’s when I learned too that loving this place and loving the idea of a farm can be more than just being a farmer, you can kind of encapsulate and give the farm life in a different way,” Wyse said. “I think that’s what I’ve always slowly been trying to do without realizing it, and making a sustainable, hopefully, living on a farm without having the normal direction in it.”
The Wyse Guide: A ‘respite’ in the constant consumption of content
Wyse Guide’s Instagram account had 3,000-4,000 followers at the time of the pandemic. It now has 450,000.
Facebook now has 985,000.
The Wyse Guide website, in a year on average, sees 400,000-500,000 users a month, Kratzer said.
Wyse tests recipes. He gets in front of the camera to film both indoors and out throughout the week. He maintains his garden. Kratzer is responsible for managing the website and being the person behind the camera. This is just some of what the pair are responsible for as they create content for the Wyse Guide website and social media.
Like its name suggests, Wyse Guide strives to be a resource, answering questions for people working on their vegetable garden, wanting to try their hand at homemade applesauce or curious about how to pick a pumpkin. In fact, the website is something the duo are focusing on to ensure it’s “truly a good resource” for people, Kratzer said.
Wyse Guide attracts people for a variety of reasons, the founders say.
People see what Wyse is up to and it transports them to their own memories of doing the same, or maybe, the memories of their loved ones they used to visit. And what is presented on Wyse Guide may be “little respite” for Wyse’s audience from all the other content they consume, Wyse said.
Julia Child and Martha Stewart, those were people to turn to learn from, and while doing so, connect with, he said.
“Not that I’m really truly there … but it’s exciting to think maybe I could be that person to just show and teach some things that maybe you don’t know how to do and maybe you’re going to use in your daily life — I’m not trying to break the internet by saying, ‘This garden is going to change your life,’” Wyse said. “But it’s going to be like, ‘This garden is going to be something that gives you food and it’s going to be really easy to do.’”
Where to find and follow Wyse Guide, Kaleb Wyse
Known for: Sharing recipes, gardening tips and lifestyle content on an Iowa farm
Learn more about Kaleb Wyse’s gardening tips in ‘Off Hours’
Kaleb Wyse shares with the Des Moines Register his advice for folks new to vegetable gardens and how to know what grows well in your area for the Off Hours newsletter this week.
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Paris Barraza is a trending and general assignment reporter at the Des Moines Register. Reach her at . Follow her on Twitter @ParisBarraza.