Racines ⚜
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Racines

French Genealogy Research — racines means “roots”

Somewhere in France, a parish register holds your family's name, written by candlelight centuries ago. I'm a French native, based in the United States, and finding that page is what I do.

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New to French genealogy? Start with our complete guide →

Where this began

It started with an old mill

Before this was a service, it was an obsession. In my own family's corner of France stands an old stone mill. Its wheel stopped turning long ago, but its walls clearly had stories to tell. I wanted to know them all.

So I went looking. Through parish registers and civil records, notarial deeds and land rolls, censuses and old maps, I followed that building and the families around it back through revolutions, wars, marriages and harvests, until the trail reached the 1500s. Along the way I learned to read the beautiful, difficult handwriting of village priests and royal notaries, to navigate the archives of France department by department, and to coax stories out of documents that most people would walk past without a glance.

“A record is never just a date. It's a person, standing in a particular village, on a particular morning of their life.”
— the conviction behind Racines

What I felt when those centuries opened up, standing in the present and reading the names of the people who came before, is something I believe every family deserves to feel. That is why I created Racines: to do for your family what I did for mine.

What I do

From a family name in America
to a village in France

I specialize in one thing: tracing American and Canadian families back to their French origins, and then deep into the French archives. France only, because depth beats breadth.

Step One

Find the bridge

The hardest part of French research is discovering where in France your family came from. I work backward through American sources (naturalization papers, ship manifests, church and marriage records) until the name of a French town or village emerges.

Step Two

Enter the archives

France's records are extraordinary: civil registration since 1792, parish registers often back to the 1600s, military rolls, censuses, notarial deeds. I read them in their original French, old handwriting included, and follow your line generation by generation.

Step Three

Tell the story

You don't receive a pile of dates. You receive your family's story: who they were, where they lived, what they did, how they fit into the France of their time, with every fact anchored to a document you can see.

What you receive

A written research report in clear English, telling your family's story and documenting every step of the research; copies of the original French records with translations of the essential passages; a family tree of the generations traced; and an honest account of what was searched, what was found, and which doors remain open for the future. If a record doesn't exist or can't yet be accessed, you'll know exactly why, and what could unlock it.

Why Racines

A French native, on American time

French is my mother tongue

The records are in French, often in handwriting that challenges even native readers. I grew up with the language, and I've trained myself on centuries of old script, from royal notaries to village priests.

I know the archives from the inside

France's departmental archives are a magnificent labyrinth. I know how they're organized, which registers exist for which villages, what's digitized, and how to politely ask a French town hall for what isn't.

Based in the United States

I live and work in the US. We talk during your day, in your time zone, in English. You get the access of a researcher in France with the availability of a consultant next door.

I've walked this road myself

Racines wasn't born as a business plan. It was born in the archives, tracing my own family's old stones back to the 1500s. I bring a practitioner's method and a descendant's heart.

Proof, not promises

A real family, from a marriage certificate
to two Alsatian villages

Nicole wrote to me ten days before flying to Alsace. All she had was the word France on an 1887 marriage record from Paterson, New Jersey.

Case Study · Haut-Rhin, Alsace

From Paterson, New Jersey to Two Villages in Alsace

Three American records gave three different countries of birth for the same couple. A name nobody could read had blocked the paternal line for years, and one wrong digit on a 1938 death certificate had been sending every search into the wrong volume.

Elizabeth Merck
SOULTZ
23 December 1863, at one in the morning
Joseph Seckler
BUHL
19 June 1862, at nine in the morning

Read the case study →
“You've added an entirely different dimension to this trip for my mom and me.”
— Nicole, Founding Families

Or go straight to the full research report Nicole received, with every source cited.

See all case studies →

A rare invitation

The Founding Families

I'm preparing to open Racines professionally. But before I ever charge a client, I want to sharpen every step of my craft on real families across the U.S. and Canada, and I'd rather do that generously than quietly.

So here is the invitation: I will take on a small number of families and research their French origins completely free of charge. Genuine research in the actual French archives, with the same written report and document copies my future clients will receive.

What you get

Genuine French genealogy research at no cost: the bridge to your French village, the dive into the archives, and a documented story of what I find.

What I ask in return

Your honest feedback on the experience and, if you're delighted, permission to share your family's story (anonymized if you prefer) as one of my founding case studies.

Who this is for

Families who know or suspect French roots, whether from a French name, a family legend, or an ancestor from Alsace or Normandy or anywhere in between, and who are curious to finally know.

An honest note

Genealogy is research, not magic: I can promise rigor and transparency, never a specific outcome. If a trail runs cold, you'll receive a clear account of what was searched and what might unlock it.

Tell me about your family

Even a single surname and a family legend is enough to start the conversation. Two of the boxes below are optional, and "I don't know" is a perfectly good answer.

A guess is fine. So is leaving it empty: finding the village is often the whole job.

Names, approximate dates, places, where the family settled in North America, the stories that have been repeated at the table. Anything.

The question that has stayed open in your family, if there is one.

I use what you write here only to reply to you. I don't share it with anyone, and you will not be added to any list.

Spots are limited, and joining the list does not guarantee selection: if I receive more requests than I can take on, I will select a small number of families whose research I believe I can serve best, but I will personally reply to everyone, either way.

About

Bonjour, I'm François

I'm a Frenchman living in the United States. Genealogy began for me the way it begins for most people: with a question about where my own family came from. It became a passion the day the archives answered back. Years of research later, having traced my family's history and its old mill deep into the 1500s, I'm turning that passion toward helping American and Canadian families find their own way home to France.

When you write to me, you write to the person who will actually do the research. No call centers, no subcontractors: just a researcher who loves this work, on your side of the Atlantic.

— François

Contact

Write to me

Questions, curiosity, a family name you've always wondered about: my inbox is open, and I reply personally to every message.

francois@racinesgenealogy.com