MATTHEW Buddan, a passionate history lover and content creator, has been enlightening many on social media with his ‘12 am Facts’ series, delving into the lesser-known aspects of Jamaican history and culture that he hopes to help preserve.

Sharing historical facts about things, places, and events such as the Balaclava train crash, the Bog Walk Tube incident, Jamaica’s first amusement park, and more, Buddan amassed an audience of over 20,000 people who tune in to learn more about the island they know and love.

He told the Jamaica Observer that “being surrounded by people who loved history made me want to be able to share at least what I know with others. If I [found] it interesting, I thought at least put it out there, maybe somebody else finds it interesting as well.”

Originally, Buddan said the series was just a late-night hobby to pass the time, but seeing its impact and the lack of knowledge about Jamaica’s history among citizens, he decided to continue.

“I’ve had a lot of people say, ‘You touch a memory with this one,’ ‘Thank you for reminding me about this, I totally forgot about this’,” he said.

“I’ve had students reach out to me and say, ‘Sir, is your material me a use for some of the topics in CXC’, and I felt so good to hear that, to know that your content is being used for reference. I‘ve even had teachers reach out to me to say, ‘You’re doing a fantastic job, I didn’t even know this’,” he said.

The history lover shared that conversations with older Jamaicans or questions about certain aspects of Jamaican culture and history drive his curiosity, sending him on a deep dive for information.

“My mother used to always tell me, ‘You know where Hydel Group of Schools is? Oh, there was an amusement park [Coney Park] there’ and I didn’t believe her because I’m looking at Hydel Group of Schools and there are no remnants of an amusement park, so when I saw the videos…and pictures of it I was like okay, let me do a video on this,” said Buddan.

He said that his information deep dives led him to discover many interesting facts about things and places in Jamaica that he thought others should also know, sharing that information with the Sunday Observer.

“Did you know that even before the whole New Kingston was built you had this huge race course? That’s where horse racing was done before it moved to Caymanas Park, and even in that location they had rides there and stuff like that, so even way before Coney Park, you had traces of amusement parks in Jamaica,” he said bubbling with excitement as he shared the information.

Buddan said he also discovered that at one point Jamaica manufactured cars, information he found particularly interesting.

“I was saying to myself, ‘Jamaica imports so much, in what lifetime did we have the facilities to manufacture a vehicle?’… I took great enjoyment reading up on that topic and the one about Jamaica’s first serial killer,” he said.

The history lover added that recently he did a video on the Ferry Inn, a go-to rest stop for people travelling from Kingston, Spanish Town, and Portmore established in the 1670s.

Reflecting on the Jamaican education system, he said he was saddened by the fact that many of these historic events, places, or things are not taught in schools.

“It’s a shame that we don’t learn more about our country. I believe that they teach content that they think or deem to be important, but history is history. Yes, there might be some level of importance, but that doesn’t stop you from teaching it to the general public,” said Buddan.

“It’s so crazy to me because Jamaica is so special. Jamaica was the first Caribbean country to receive a train system and so many people didn’t know that. I had to be digging down to find that, because even our pages don’t make this information mainstream,” he said.

“History deserves to be fun and it deserves to not be repetitive. My job, I’m just trying to make history more accepted. I’m trying to bridge that gap between the topic and the younger audience especially, that’s one of my main goals because the younger folks do not appreciate the history of Jamaica whatsoever,” he told the Observer.

With this goal in mind, the history lover said he plans to purchase new equipment to advance the quality of his work and get viewers a closer look at some of the historical sites he mentions in his videos.

“I want to go on-site to some of these obscure locations. You have Jamaica with the underground tunnel systems, you have certain abandoned buildings where I want to get a drone, especially, or places with water I want to send the drones to get some proper footage of these places,” he said, listing Rodney’s Lookout, an old signalling station located in the old port town of Port Henderson, St Catherine, as one of the locations he plans to visit.

“I just want to do things like that to give people a different view and love of history,” he said.