Family historian uses Grok to track down an ancestor's parish records near Basel and translate them, then writes a family book

What they did

Her family history stopped at a couple who came to the US in 1749; the man's name and his home city of Basel were known, his wife's name was not. Grok helped her find the parish books for his family name, and after some digging she found his birth record, which had been hard to spot because the family had his birth year off by ten years. She traced the direct line back to 1519, later found his wife's records in her hometown's parish book, and used Grok to translate the records.

How it went

She wrote a book with what she found and gave it to her grandfather for his 90th birthday, and the research led her to meet relatives still living near the village.

Worth knowing

• Finding the wife's records took about a year of searching, and the AI did not do the digging alone. Old handwriting and translations can be wrong, so check key names and dates against the original records.
• Price check: Grok: free plan; Plus (The X Subscription): US$8/month, or US$6.67/month on a yearly plan (US$80/year) (checked Nov 2, 2026).

Try it yourself

Paste this into a chatbot, then add your own details underneath.

I'm tracing an ancestor. Here is what I know: name, rough birth year, the town or city they came from, and when they emigrated. Tell me which church or civil records would cover them, where those records are likely kept or scanned online, and how to search if my dates may be off by several years. When I paste or upload a record, transcribe it and translate it into English.

More people who did this

• Eric The Reb (@EricTheReb) (X, Oct 30, 2026): Had Grok Bot look up his family tree with little input; he said it did an OK job and could read a screenshot of a newspaper from the 1920s.

Original post

See kate (@KateManthei)'s original post on X → (Nov 2, 2026)