Real research, start to finish
Case Studies
What the family already knew, where the trail broke, what I did about it, and what the archives finally said. Told with the dead ends left in, because those are the part that shows how the work is actually done.
Haut-Rhin, Alsace · August 2026
From Paterson, New Jersey to Two Villages in Alsace
Nicole had ten days before her flight and one question: where in Alsace were her great-great-grandparents born? Three American records gave three different answers, a name nobody could read had blocked the paternal line, and a single wrong digit on a 1938 death certificate had been sending searches into the wrong volume for years.
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Or read the full research report itself, with every source cited, exactly as the family received it.
“You should have seen my reaction when I realized not only that my great-great-grandmother really was from Soultz all along, but that my great-great-grandfather was born only a few miles up the road in Buhl.”
While you wait for the next one
Twenty-seven guides to researching a family in France, free to read.
- Start here: how to trace your French ancestry, the whole journey in one guide, from your own attic to a parish register.
- How to find the French village your ancestor came from, the hardest step, and the one this case study turns on.
- Finding your Alsatian ancestors, why a family can be French in 1887 and German in 1898 without moving an inch.
- How to read old French handwriting, the formulas that turn a wall of scribbles into a readable act.
- All twenty-seven guides, from Cajun and Acadian roots to French citizenship by descent.
The next one could be yours
Before my professional launch, I'm researching a small number of families completely free of charge, in exchange for honest feedback and, if you're happy with the result, permission to tell the story.
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