John Godwin rose to fame as a reality star in the A&E hit series, Duck Dynasty. He recurred over the course of eleven seasons, and the show’s success made history as the most-watched non-fiction series available on cable.

Hailing from Louisiana, Godwin grew up hunting deer in the south with his father. But his passion quickly switched to waterfowl, leading him to master his duck calls. He was such a natural talent, that as a teen, he competed in various calling competitions, and placed third in his first contest ever.

This led Godwin to pursue hunting professionally, and he was employed by the Robertson family in 2002, working for their company Duck Commander (AKA, the business that Duck Dynasty follows). Godwin has all sorts of duties, from designing decoys to catch ducks, to overseeing shipping and supplies, to building duck calls; those duck calls are what made Duck Commander a multi-million dollar company.

During his time on the show, Godwin saw a spike in his social media following: he has over 250K followers on Instagram, over 600K on Twitter, and nearly 800K likes on Facebook, to date. Additionally, the show became a huge profit center, earning over $400 million dollars just from show merchandise, alone. After establishing himself as a reality star, Godwin has since appeared on other programs, such as The Art of Commanding Ducks, Best of the Duckmen, and Duckmen 7-18.

Outside of hunting waterfowl, Godwin is also an award-winning fisherman, and he recently joined Duck Commander’s sister company, Fin Commander.