I’ve combined Amy Johnson Crow’s 52 ancestors in 52 weeks challenge, and Steve Little’s The 2025 AI Genealogy Do-Over, to create a unique 52 AI ancestors in 52 weeks party!

52 AI Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 52: Memorable

“In Memory of those who have gone and in thought of those who are to follow.”
— John Edwin Stillwell, M.D. (1850–1930)

This final post isn’t about one particular ancestor. It’s about all of them.

Every name, every face, every fragment of a life uncovered in the past 52 weeks has added weight, color, and texture to my understanding of who I am, and who we are, as a people. With each ancestor researched through the combination of traditional genealogy and the assistance of AI, I wasn’t just gathering names for a tree. I was gathering stories for a mirror.

“History remembers only the celebrated, genealogy remembers them all.”
— attributed to Laurence Overmire

These 52 stories reminded me that every person in our lineage, no matter how quiet their footprint, left a mark on the world we now live in. From unnamed daughters to war widows, from coal miners to schoolteachers, their resilience speaks across time.

Image created 22Dec2025 by Google Gemini’s Nano Banana
“generate a family tree but with faces instead of names”

What Made This Year Memorable

I started this AI-enhanced journey curious. Could artificial intelligence really help me connect with my ancestors? Turns out, it could help organize, interpret, and spark connections I might’ve otherwise missed. But the heart of each story still came from the very human experience of wondering: What would I have done in their shoes?

Week by week, I found myself growing more compassionate. Not just toward the people in my tree, but toward people in my life. Struggles I used to see as personal failings – financial troubles, lost children, fractured families – started to look a lot more like patterns of human survival. Universal. Enduring. Shared.

Researching these ancestors didn’t just bring me closer to the past. It brought me closer to people in the present.

How AI Played Its Role

AI was my lab assistant: sorting census details, cleaning up timelines, nudging me to look at things from a new angle. It never tried to be the storyteller, and that was the beauty of it. Tools like ChatGPT helped me brainstorm questions, dive into social history, and even imagine how I might show information more clearly. But the meaning and the emotions are mine and always will be.

Challenge for You: One Last Time

I’ll leave you with one final challenge:
Take a moment to reflect on your own “all of them.” Not just the ancestors whose names you know, but the ones who left behind no photographs, no letters, maybe not even a gravestone. Imagine what they endured, and what they hoped for.

Write them a note. Light a candle. Tell someone their name. And if you’re inclined, try letting AI help you tell their story next time. You might be surprised what comes back.

Want to Learn More?

You can review the full 52 weeks of AI-assisted ancestor stories here: https://janetbgenealogy.wordpress.com/category/52-ancestors-in-52-weeks/

And if you’re curious about the AI Genealogy Do-Over that inspired this blend of tech and tradition, check out Steve Little’s work at AI Genealogy Insights.

And the major inspiration for this series was 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks.

AI Disclosure

This post was created by me with the help of AI tools. While AI helps organize research, the storytelling and discoveries are my own.

Next Week’s Topic: This series may be complete, but the stories aren’t. What would you like to explore next?

I’ve combined Amy Johnson Crow’s 52 ancestors in 52 weeks challenge, and Steve Little’s The 2025 AI Genealogy Do-Over, to create a unique 52 AI ancestors in 52 weeks party!

52 AI Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 50: Family heirloom

Introduction

My grandmother, Edith Lillian MAKEY WEST (1913-1997)’s mother was a BRITTON, who died when Grandma was just 3 years old.

When Grandma’s dad was widowed, he sent the children to live with his wife’s sister until he remarried, about 2 years later. This was just part of a long and enduring closeness in the family – Grandma always spoke fondly of Aunt Edith (her namesake), who never had children of her own.

Discussion

I strongly suspect it was Aunt Edith who, in the absence of a mother, helped Grandma to feel close to her maternal family and line. Grandma was always proud to be a Britton and always wondered if she was part of the old Staten Island New York BRITTON line (spoiler: she was). Grandma inherited many old family photos which I am now fortunate to have – a few of them identified, many tentatively identified, and some a mystery to this day.

I think it was this effort at connection that made the “B” forks that Grandma inherited extra precious to her. She proudly passed them on to me. I put one in a shadow box and proudly hung it up on display. (With a detailed label in the back, of course!)

When my future daughter-in-law came to visit, she was so nervous she accidentally knocked the shadow box off the wall. It came apart slightly, but I put it right back up. I’ve never fixed the crack. It’s a quiet reminder that all of us carry flaws – and we’re still worth displaying. Who knows, someday I may pass those forks down to her.  

Figure 1 Private collection of the author, photographed 2025

How AI Can Help

We often think of artificial intelligence as something high-tech and hands-off—but sometimes, it’s as down-to-earth as helping us label a fork.

Take this handwritten note, for instance. It tells the story of a simple family fork passed down through generations—from Alice Britton Makey to Edith Lillian Makey West, and eventually to me. It’s personal, precious, and easily lost in the shuffle of old photos, papers, and drawer ephemera.

Figure 2 Label from Britton fork, photographed December 2025. Private collection of the author

That’s where AI comes in.

1. Reading Handwriting

Using free apps or tools like Google Lens, Microsoft OneNote, or even genealogy-focused AI tools like Transkribus, you can snap a picture of a handwritten label like this one. AI can then transcribe it, turning it into searchable text. Suddenly, “This is a Britton fork…” becomes something you can find in your digital files, even if you forgot which folder you stashed it in.

2. Creating a Digital Heirloom Catalog

Once your handwritten notes are transcribed, AI can help catalog your heirlooms. Pair the text with a photo of the object and upload both to:

• Google Photos (with searchable tags)
• FamilySearch’s Memories section
• A private blog, shared album, or even a spreadsheet

Some AI tools (like Notion AI or Mem.ai) can also help you organize stories, people, and photos; linking objects with relatives, dates, and locations.

3. Finding Hidden Clues

AI can help you recognize names, places, and patterns you might miss. Is “Alice Britton Makey” showing up in census records you hadn’t noticed? Does the handwriting match other letters in your collection? With a little help, AI can connect the dots across generations – and across the pages in your shoebox.

4. Let AI Help You Cite Your Sources

I highly recommend Dr. Tom Jones for citation help – one of his courses, or his book Mastering Genealogical Documentation. But, if I may be blunt, a half-assed sourcing is better than no sourcing. Just do it! Let AI help you create a source citation: ask for one in the style of the Chicago Manual of Style (which genealogical citations are based on). Tools like ChatGPT or Claude can take your messy notes and return a decent first draft. It’s not cheating, it’s documenting smarter.

Challenge for Readers

This week, try this:

1. Take a photo of a label, note, or handwritten item from your collection.
2. Use a free app (like Google Lens or OneNote) to convert it into text.
3. Pair the text with a photo of the item in a digital file or document.

Bonus round: Ask AI to suggest which ancestor the item might belong to based on names mentioned in the text. You might get a match you hadn’t considered.

Want to Learn More?

Cataloging Ephemera & Heirlooms

Whether it’s a fork, a photograph, or a funeral card, ephemera deserves a safe, searchable home. These tools and guides can help:

• FamilySearch Memories – A free space to upload photos, documents, and heirloom stories. Connects to your family tree. https://www.familysearch.org/memories
• Google Photos – Use searchable tags and facial recognition to keep track of who’s who and what’s what. Great for visual cataloging.
• Notion or Airtable – Create your own digital heirloom tracker with images, tags, and notes. (For spreadsheet lovers and chaos wranglers.)

Citing Genealogical Sources (Without the Fear)

If you’ve ever stared at a census record and wondered, “How exactly do I cite this without summoning Elizabeth Shown Mills in a puff of citation smoke?”, you’re not alone.

• Evidence Explained by Elizabeth Shown Mills – The gold standard for genealogical citations. Not just for academics. Her companion website is a treasure trove of citation models and how-tos. https://www.evidenceexplained.com
• FamilySearch Wiki: Source Citations – Beginner-friendly and surprisingly thorough. https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Source_Citation_Guide
• Cite-Builder Tools – Some genealogy sites like Ancestry and MyHeritage now offer automatic citation builders. Use with care, and a grain of salt. They’re generally better at citing the record group than your individual find.

And don’t forget: your heirloom’s story is a source. If you’ve got a label, inscription, or oral history, document where it came from. “Private collection of the author, scanned in 2025” goes a long way toward future-proofing your family archive.

Next Week’s Topic

“Musical”

AI Disclosure

This post was created by me with the help of AI tools. While AI helps organize research, the storytelling and discoveries are my own.

I’ve combined Amy Johnson Crow’s 52 ancestors in 52 weeks challenge, and Steve Little’s The 2025 AI Genealogy Do-Over, to create a unique 52 AI ancestors in 52 weeks party!

52 AI Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 46: Wartime

Introduction

My grandfather, Edward Joseph Anderson (1912-1985), was a small child when World War I broke out. My father told me that Grandpa always felt he had an education gap about the war, due to the timing. He was too young when the events were current to really know what was happening, but the war had not yet been added to the curriculum at school.

Grandpa, according to Dad, sought out books about the war to help him to understand more about it. I’m sure he knew many, many people affected by it.

Maybe that curiosity never left him. He lived through the sound of distant news and ration talk he couldn’t quite grasp, and spent the rest of his life filling in what those childhood memories left unsaid.

That curiosity must run in the family. As a genealogist, I find myself chasing the same questions Grandpa did: trying to understand how war shaped the lives of people who lived in its shadow. His books led him to the battlefields of Europe; my search led me to the stories of our own family during wartime.

Discussion

Grandpa wasn’t the only one shaped by war, even from a distance. Once I started exploring our family’s wartime stories, I realized that every generation had its own version of it.

There were those who registered but never served, those who built ships and newspapers and families while the world was breaking apart, and those who were too young to know why the adults whispered at night. Each carried a piece of the story, whether they realized it or not.

It turns out, wartime isn’t just about those who fight – it’s also about those who remember, imagine, and try to make sense of what they lived through. Discovering those stories isn’t always straightforward. Records can be scarce or scattered, but even fragments can lead somewhere.

How AI can help

These stories aren’t always easy to find. Military records can be confusing, incomplete, or hidden behind unfamiliar names – but that’s where a bit of modern help can make all the difference.

Some ideas:

• Many draft registration lists are now online.
• Newspapers frequently printed the list of draftees (and newspapers are going online)
• Censuses often show us those who served (extra shoutout to the 1865 New York State census!)
• Censuses also show us occupations, which may be war-related ones
• Family ephemera may include this type of memento, such as when my grandmother showed me my baby father’s ration books

Ask AI for more ideas – or where to find them. Better yet, tell it what you know. (“My ancestor John Q. Doe, born 1842, lived in Argentine, Kansas during the Civil War. Where might I find records around any military service he may have done?”)

But don’t limit yourself to military service – remember not all those who served carried a gun. Maybe they carried water or provided food.

Or maybe they got shot in the draft riots?

Challenge for Readers

Option 1: Trace a Wartime Shadow

Pick one ancestor who lived during a major war – even if they never served.

• What might they have seen, heard, or felt?
• Search a newspaper from their hometown during that era and read the local headlines.
• Bonus: Ask ChatGPT or another AI tool to describe what life was like on their street in that year.

You may not find a uniform, but you’ll find the echoes.

Option 2: Find Service Between the Lines

Review your family tree and see whose records fall between 1861–65, 1914–18, or 1941–45.

• Who was the right age to serve but didn’t?
• Can you find a draft registration, ration book, or even a letter?
• Use AI to suggest possible record sets or archives for your search; try phrasing it as:

“Where might I find Civil War service records for a 23-year-old farmer in Ohio?”

Sometimes the “almost served” stories are just as revealing.

Option 3: The Home Front Project

Choose one ancestor who supported the war effort in a civilian way; through work, care, or quiet resilience.

• What was their occupation during wartime?
• Search for how that industry contributed to the war effort.
• Then ask AI to summarize what that role might have looked like day to day.

Think of it as writing a tribute to the people who kept the lights on while the world went dark.

Optional Add-On: Reflective Prompt

If your ancestors could tell you how war changed them, what might they say?
Try writing a short paragraph, diary entry, or AI-assisted dialogue in their voice.

Want to Learn More?

National Archives – Military Service Records
https://www.archives.gov/veterans/military-service-records
Request copies of World War I and II draft cards, enlistment papers, or service records. You can also explore state-level archives for older conflicts.

FamilySearch – Military Collections
https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/location/1927084
Free access to global military collections, including U.S. draft registrations, Civil War pensions, and state militia rolls.

Fold3 (Ancestry)
https://www.fold3.com
Digitized military records, photos, and unit histories. Look for regimental pages to understand where and when your ancestor might have served.

Newspapers.com or Chronicling America
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov
Historic newspapers often printed lists of draftees, letters from soldiers, or wartime updates from hometowns.

WWI Draft Registration Database – National Archives Catalog
https://catalog.archives.gov/id/641776
Search for men born between 1873 and 1900 who registered for the Great War, even if they were never called up.

AI Prompts for Wartime Research
Ask ChatGPT or a similar tool:

• “What military units were based near [ancestor’s hometown] in [year]?”
• “List possible civilian roles in [industry or location] during WWII.”
• “Summarize how [occupation] supported the war effort.”

For Context and Reflection

• JSTOR Daily: Life on the Home Front – https://daily.jstor.org
• Smithsonian Magazine – Stories from the Great War – https://www.smithsonianmag.com

Summary

My grandfather filled his understanding of war with books. I’ve tried to fill mine with stories—his, and those of the family who came before him. In both cases, the search is what keeps memory alive.

Next Week’s Topic: “The Name’s the Same”

AI Disclosure

This post was created by me with the help of AI tools. While AI helps organize research, the storytelling and discoveries are my own.

I’ve combined Amy Johnson Crow’s 52 ancestors in 52 weeks challenge, and Steve Little’s The 2025 AI Genealogy Do-Over, to create a unique 52 AI ancestors in 52 weeks party!

52 AI Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 45: Multiple

Introduction

My ancestor Charlotte DuShannon West had multiple birthdays.

Discussion

The family stories on my WEST line generally proved out, time and again. So, I can enter into this with high confidence.

The family said that Charlotte DuShannon was orphaned “around age 3,” and they (officials? the orphanage? Oh the questions I should have asked!) didn’t know her birthday, so they chose Christmas.

Lottie’s tombstone has an 1867 birth, and her death certificate has a death on April 10, 1922 at age 54/3/15, calculating to December 26, 1867. So the family had, indeed, pinned her birth at Christmas 1867.

Figure 1 Charlotte DuShannon West, 1866-1922

But when was she actually born? I wasn’t sure I’d ever find her real birth date—but then I stumbled onto a tool that opened a whole new world: the Family History Center (now FamilySearch center) and its microfilm ordering.

Lo and behold: Bridgeport, Connecticut had her birth recorded:

Very clearly on May 14, 1866.

To the same parents I found her with (age 3) in the 1870 census.

Great-grandma Lottie now has her true birthday.

How AI can help

AI can’t rewrite the past—but it can help us recognize patterns, surface forgotten records, and challenge long-held assumptions.

In Lottie’s case, AI tools can:

• Surface hidden records: Language models can help generate search strategies to uncover early-life records, especially in unfamiliar places or when names vary slightly. For instance, suggesting that a “Charlotte Dushannon” born in Connecticut in 1866 might appear under “Shannon,” “Duchennan,” or “Chanon.”
• Check the math: AI and genealogy apps can cross-check reported death ages and calculate likely birth years automatically—especially when the age-at-death is written as years/months/days.
• Fill narrative gaps: Story generators like ChatGPT can simulate possible journal entries or “what it was like” vignettes of life in an orphanage in the 1870s, giving context to records that lack detail.
• Create timelines: Use AI-assisted timelines to reconcile census entries, birth records, and tombstones, highlighting discrepancies like Lottie’s multiple birthdays.

Lottie’s birth wasn’t celebrated on her actual birthday during her lifetime, but with the help of research and modern tools, we can give her story a more complete arc.

Summary

There’s something quietly heartbreaking about not knowing your own birthday. No candles. No certainty. No story behind the date, just a placeholder.

For Lottie, the family chose Christmas. A beautiful guess, full of warmth and meaning. But it wasn’t hers.

Thanks to one lonely line in a birth register, we now know the truth: she was born on a spring day in May.

And somehow, after all this time, that feels worth celebrating.

Challenge for Readers

Option 1: The Birthday Audit

Check your family tree for ancestors with:

• Conflicting birthdates across records (e.g., tombstones vs. census vs. certificates)
• “Estimated” birth years based on age at death

👉 Use a date calculator tool or AI to double-check the math. Post about your findings – did anyone else get a holiday birthday as a placeholder?

Option 2: Find the Forgotten Birthday

Pick one ancestor with no known birthdate and challenge yourself to:

• Search at least 3 record types that might include it (census, church, delayed birth certs, military draft cards, etc.)
• Use AI to generate alternative search spellings or suggest overlooked sources

Bonus: Let ChatGPT write a hypothetical birthday scene based on what you do know about their childhood.

Option 3: The Mystery Birthday Prompt

Ask ChatGPT:

“Write a fictional diary entry from a woman in 1922 who has just discovered that the birthday she’s celebrated her whole life is wrong.”

Post or reflect on what that might have felt like—for her, or for one of your ancestors.

Want to Go Deeper?

FamilySearch Record Hints
https://www.familysearch.org

• Use AI-driven record suggestions to find alternate birth, census, and death records.

Date Calculators for Genealogy
Legacy Date Calculator

• Check calculated birthdates from death ages (like 54 years, 3 months, 15 days).

ChatGPT Genealogy Prompts
Try asking:

“What name variants might I search for Charlotte DuShannon in 1860s Connecticut?”
“Simulate a diary entry for a 3-year-old girl entering an orphanage in 1870 Connecticut.”

Historic Context
Orphanages in 19th Century America – JSTOR Daily

• For background if you want to explore what Lottie’s early years might have been like.

Next Week’s Topic: “Wartime”

AI Disclosure

This post was created by me with the help of AI tools. While AI helps organize research, the storytelling and discoveries are my own.

I’ve combined Amy Johnson Crow’s 52 ancestors in 52 weeks challenge, and Steve Little’s The 2025 AI Genealogy Do-Over, to create a unique 52 AI ancestors in 52 weeks party!

52 AI Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 44: Rural

The Organist from Liberty Center: A Rural Life Worth Recreating (With a Little Help From AI)

Some ancestors are loud. They leave behind war records, dramatic migrations, or juicy newspaper clippings. Others, like A. Gordon West, a linotype operator from tiny Liberty Center, Ohio, make their mark in quieter ways. But quiet doesn’t mean unimportant.

Gordon’s life, filled with music, roses, typefaces, and the occasional practical joke, offers a beautiful glimpse into rural America during the rise of the 20th century. And with today’s tools, we don’t need a time machine to visit his world. Artificial Intelligence (AI) can help us recreate and explore rural lives like Gordon’s in ways his generation couldn’t have imagined.

Let’s see what we can learn from a small-town organist who pressed letters into lead by day and grew tomatoes by twilight.

Meet Gordon: Organist, Typesetter, Tomato Whisperer

Gordon West was born in 1907 in Liberty Center, Ohio, the youngest child of Adam and Charlotte (DuShannon) West. His mother was 40 when she had him, and he was very much the “surprise baby.”

As a young man, Gordon played the organ for silent movies; a job that required timing, musical improvisation, and the ability to work in total darkness except for the flicker of the screen. He shifted gears after “talkies” replaced silent films and the Great Depression hit full-on, becoming a linotype operator at the Staten Island Advance newspaper.

Imagine the jolt of going from a Liberty Center of 748 people to a city of nearly 7 million people, and living there for 40 years.

After retirement, he moved to upstate New York, growing roses and tomatoes, playing the organ for his granddaughters, and slipping jokes into everyday moments. His life was rural, yes; but rich, rhythmic, and full of character.

Recreating Rural Lives with AI

Let’s say you want to bring Gordon’s world to life for a blog post, family gathering, or research journal. AI offers tools to fill in the sensory gaps and imagine the life behind the records. Here are a few ideas:

🧠 1. Rebuild a Scene with AI Art

Using image generators (like DALL·E, Bing Image Creator, Leonardo.ai (I recently used ChatGPT to create a prompt for Leonardo – big success), or Midjourney), you could describe Gordon’s world and get a visual to share:

Prompt: “A small-town movie theater in 1927 with a man playing a pipe organ, children watching silently, flickering film projection, Liberty Center, Ohio.”

You can generate what his work looked like, or the family garden in bloom – right down to those roses and tomatoes.

🗞️ 2. Simulate a Newspaper Page

Use AI text tools (like ChatGPT or Sudowrite) to help you generate a mock Staten Island Advance page from the 1950s, maybe even one that mentions Gordon’s role in the print room. Combine this with templates from historical newspapers to bring it to life.

🎹 3. Create a Soundtrack to His Life

Tools like Soundraw or Mubert let you generate music in different genres and moods. Try crafting a short organ interlude or instrumental that fits a 1920s silent film. Pair it with a photo of Gordon and his organ, and suddenly your ancestor becomes an experience.

Your Challenge: Make Rural Real

If you’re ready to play time traveler, try one (or both) of these challenges using free or freemium tools:

🧪 Challenge 1: Build Gordon’s Garden

Use DALL·E or Bing Image Creator to generate a visual of a Liberty Center backyard with roses, tomatoes, and a retired organist in suspenders. Add this to your genealogy blog or family tree. Let your readers see what he might have seen.

🧪 Challenge 2: Write a Fictional Entry in His Voice

Ask ChatGPT (or another text-based AI) to help you write a short journal entry from Gordon’s point of view:

Prompt: “Write a 100-word diary entry from a retired linotype operator named Gordon West in rural Ohio, talking about growing tomatoes and playing the organ for his grandkids.”

This builds connection. It doesn’t have to be perfect; it just has to be personal.

What We Learn from Lives Like Gordon’s

Genealogy often celebrates the pioneers, the politicians, the rebels. But the rural linotype operator? The silent movie organist? They matter just as much.

Gordon West’s life was ordinary in the best possible way: full of music, work, and love for his family. AI gives us new ways to honor these lives – by imagining their world and sharing it with future generations.

Whether you’re using AI to restore a photo, simulate a voice, or generate a visual of your ancestor’s life, remember this: even the smallest towns hold big stories.

Further Resources

• Bing Image Creator: https://www.bing.com/images/create
• DALL·E (via ChatGPT): Use image prompts to recreate scenes https://chatgpt.com/
• Historic Newspaper Templates: Try Canva for vintage layouts https://www.canva.com/
• Soundraw (AI music): https://soundraw.io
• Explore Silent Movie Music: https://silentfilmmusic.com

Next Week’s Topic: “Multiple”

AI Disclosure

This post was created by me with the help of AI tools. While AI helps organize research, the storytelling and discoveries are my own.