Ancestors and Algorithms: AI for Genealogy
Stuck on a family history brick wall? It's time to add the most powerful tool to your genealogy toolkit: Artificial Intelligence. Welcome to Ancestors and Algorithms, the definitive guide to revolutionizing your family tree research with AI.
Forget the hype and confusion. This isn't just another podcast about AI; this is your hands-on, step-by-step masterclass using AI. Each week, host and researcher Brian demystifies the technology and shows you exactly how to apply AI tools to find ancestors, analyze records, and solve your toughest genealogy puzzles.
We explore the incredible promise of AI while navigating its perils with an honest, practical approach. Learn to use AI as your personal research assistant—not a replacement for your own critical thinking.
Join us to learn how to:
- Break through brick walls using AI-driven analysis and data correlation.
- Transcribe old, hard-to-read documents, letters, and census records in minutes.
- Use ChatGPT, Gemini, and other Generative AI to draft biographies, summarize findings, and organize your research.
- Analyze DNA matches and historical records to uncover hidden family connections.
- Master prompts that get you accurate results and avoid AI "hallucinations."
- Discover the latest AI tech and digital tools for genealogists before anyone else.
Whether you're a beginner genealogist or a seasoned family historian, if you're ready to upgrade your research skills, this podcast is for you. Hit Follow now and turn AI into your ultimate secret weapon for uncovering your ancestry.
Episodes
62 episodes
Ep. 57: Find Her Maiden Name: Proving Parents with Indirect Evidence and AI
No record names her parents, and you can still prove them. This episode shows how, step by step, with 5 ordinary records and 3 free AI tools.Every family tree has a woman like Nancy Brockway: a first name, a married surname, and nothing...
Ep. 56: Negative Evidence: Dating a Death in Czech Texas
Texas did not register deaths statewide until 1903, so if your ancestor died there in the 1890s, no death certificate was ever created. This week, a county tax roll dated one anyway.Cyril Sebesta came to Fayette County, Texas from Moravi...
Ep. 55: The Blast Radius Method - Audit Your Family Tree With AI
Most genealogists audit a family tree by hunting for blanks. The dangerous conclusions are the ones that already have a source attached.In this episode, Brian builds a fifteen-person test GEDCOM with five deliberately planted errors, th...
Ep. 54: The Marine They Couldn't Bring Home - WWII DNA Identification & AI Genealogy Research
A Marine killed at Tarawa in 1943 was declared non-recoverable in 1949, but DNA proved eighty-one years later he had actually been buried within days. It was the paperwork that failed him, not the men who buried him.This episode is for ...
Ep. 53: The Recording I Almost Didn't Make
A family told the same story about a 1948 move for nearly eighty years. One recorded interview and three AI tools changed that.Effie Napier is eighty-eight, and by her family's account, the last person alive who actually remembers why th...
Ep. 52: The Parish That Wouldn't Take Him Back - English Poor Law Records
In 1836, a Yorkshire parish legally removed a laborer to a village he'd probably never lived in, over his father's old apprenticeship. This episode uses Claude, Gemini, and ChatGPT to trace an English settlement dispute through parish chest rec...
Ep. 51: The Jewish Shtetl No Map Remembers
A Jewish ancestor's hometown was spelled three different ways across three documents. A 1985 algorithm and three AI tools narrowed it down. This episode shows exactly how, and exactly where the method stops working.This episode is for yo...
Ep. 50: Can the New Genealogy AI Crack Hazel's Wall? | FamilySearch AI Research Assistant vs Ancestry AncestryAI and Get Ideas, Tested
Episode 50, The AI Lab: Brian tests four AI features built directly into FamilySearch and Ancestry, using a five-question trust rubric built live with Claude, to find out which ones you can actually trust with your family tree. One of the four ...
Ep. 49: The Research Assistant That Remembers (AI for Genealogy)
Ancestors and Algorithms Episode 49, "The Research Assistant That Remembers," teaches genealogists how to build a persistent AI research assistant across three free tools: Claude Projects, Gemini Gems, and ChatGPT Custom Instructions, so you st...
Ep. 48: Also Known As - French Canadian Genealogy, Quebec Dit Names & AI Tools
A Quebec family's baptismal records begin abruptly in 1850, though family memory said they were French Canadian for generations before that. The answer is a dit name: Quebec's centuries-old tradition of alternate family surnames, in which a fam...
Ep. 47: The Pardon on the Wall - An Australian Convict Ancestor Uncovered with AI
A family believed their ancestor arrived in Australia a free man in the 1830s. A 190-year-old government pardon said otherwise, and nobody had ever read past the word "Pardon" printed across the top of it.In this episode of Ancestors and...
Ep. 46: The Paper Son - Chinese Roots and AI | Cracking a Chinese Exclusion Act Case
During the Chinese Exclusion Act, one immigrant's 200-page federal case file was built to hide his real name, and nearly succeeded.For sixty-one years, the Chinese Exclusion Act barred an entire ethnicity from immigrating to the United S...
Ep. 45: The Name on the Draft Card
A single 1917 WWI draft card, plus a naturalization petition filed seven years later, reveal an Italian immigrant's real birth name. This is a real, start-to-finish example of using AI for genealogy research, ChatGPT, Claude, and NotebookLM wor...
Ep. 44: The Email That Gets Results - AI Archive Correspondence in English and German
Use ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude to email any archive in the world, including drafting a formal German-language request, in under 15 minutes.Most genealogists stop when online records run out. But the records you need are often one pr...
Ep. 43: Crossing the U.S. Border - Hispanic Roots and AI
Three AI tools, one 1866 Mexican parish register, and the family that a U.S. census reduced to a single word: México.Brian traces composite ancestor Esteban Vasquez through two Arizona census records where birthplace r...
Ep. 42: Writing the Proof - How AI Helps You Make Your Case
You can write a genealogical proof argument using 3 AI tools in one afternoon: NotebookLM organizes your evidence, Claude drafts and stress-tests the argument, and ChatGPT reviews it for plain-language clarity. This is the GPS Mini-Series capst...
Ep. 41: Tracing Enslaved Ancestors with AI | Using Perplexity, Claude, NotebookLM, and ChatGPT to Navigate the 1870 Wall
Brian uses 4 AI tools to trace a formerly enslaved Mississippi ancestor across 6 record collections and through the 1870 Wall. This is what African American genealogy research looks like when AI and the Genealogical Proof Standard work together...
Ep. 40: Seven Heirs - How AI Decodes a Tennessee Probate Mystery
You've found the estate settlement. You've counted the heirs in the distribution sheet. And the math doesn't add up.Nine children appear in the 1860 census. Seven names appear in the 1874 settlement. Two heirs are gone with no explanatio...
Ep. 39: Norwegian Genealogy - AI Solves the Patronymic Mystery
If you can't find your Norwegian ancestor in genealogy records, the problem is almost certainly the name. Norway used a patronymic naming system until 1923, meaning most Norwegian-Americans carried completely different surnames in their homelan...
Ep. 38: The Research Map - How AI Finds the Records You're Missing
Most genealogists search 4-6 databases and miss 70% of the records that exist for their ancestor. In this episode, we fix that.If you have ever searched Ancestry, FamilySearch, and a couple of other databases and still hit a wall, this e...
Ep. 37: What Grandma Never Said - Using AI to Uncover Hidden Ancestors in Census Records
Every family has a story that got quietly handed down across the generations. A birthplace. A number of children. One marriage, one life, neatly summarized. But what happens when you sit down with the actual records and the story doesn't match?...
Ep. 36: The Highland Line - Tracing Scottish Ancestors with AI
If you have Scottish Highland ancestry and your family tree hits a wall before 1855, this episode was made for you.In Episode 36 of Ancestors and Algorithms, Brian traces a MacLeod family from the Isle of Skye using three AI tools and a ...
Ep. 35: How AI Resolves Conflicting Evidence for Immigrant Ancestors
Three records. Three completely different birthplace answers. A German Lutheran church register from Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania says New York. The 1880 US Federal Census says Germany. A Pennsylvania death certificate says Pennsylvania. All...
Ep. 34: How to Use Claude, Perplexity, ChatGPT & Gemini to Find a California Gold Rush Ancestor
Your ancestor went to California in 1849 as a forty-niner. The family says he struck it rich. But when you search the mining records for his name? Nothing. No claim. No miner's registration. No county tax list. He's a ghost.That is exact...
Ep. 33: FAN Club Method + AI - Find Ancestors Through Their Neighbors
If you have a brick wall ancestor with a common name; a William Harrison, a Mary Smith, a John Thomas this episode will change how you research forever.In Episode 33 of Ancestors and Algorithms, host Brian walks through a completely upgr...