Genealogists and family historians learn early in their research that "Every person, every famly, has a unique story, and it is our job to identify the stories and tell them." We were told by Judy G. Russell at RootsTech in 2015 that "A family story dies within three generations if it is not told" (paraphrased, not a direct quote).
What if we don't have any stories handed down over the generations? We may know that the family migrated from there to here, or served in them ilitary, or worked as a farmer or blacksmith or carpenter.
My solution to the problem of "bringing my ancestors to life" and better understanding their lives, is to use an Artificial Intelligence LLM to tell the stories by requesting them to put the ancestral family in a place and time and to use historical events and social history for context to tell a "likely" story about them. That is a "historical fiction" story but it might be the way it was, and the reader gains a bit of historical, geographical and social context to put "meat on the bones" of their ancestral family.
All I can say is that "I'm trying" -- that's why over the last year and a half I have been writing AI-assisted biographies, memoirs, stories and more about my close ancestors (back through my 3rd great-grandparents, so five generations back - 62 ancestors, 31 families). I've written at least one story every day. You can see them all in my Randy's Genealogy and AI page here.
In my post Using Artificial Intelligence In the Ancestor Biography Creation (ABC) Process - Updated (posted 12 April 2026), I suggested that one way to identify interesting family stories could be to ask an Artificial Intelligence LLM to identify "turning points" or "critical decisions" based on a factual biographical sketch. I wrote:
"You can ask the AI Tools to create suggestions for interesting 'Family Stories' or 'Turning Points' based on the Genealogical Sketch or Biography. Select specific suggestions and ask the AI Tool to tell a 'Historical Fiction' Story ("the way it might have been")."
Here is an example using the biography of my 2nd great-grandfather Devier James Lamphier Smith (1839-1894):
My Prompt to Anthropic Claude Sonnet 4.6 was: "Based on the attached biography, please provide 10 stories about Devier's life that could be told, and include a one paragraph description of each story."
The Anthropic Claude Sonnet 4.6 response was:
Looking at Devier's remarkable life, here are ten stories that could be developed into fiction, narrative nonfiction, or family history pieces:
1. The Foundling's Secret: A story exploring Devier's mysterious origins as an infant of unknown parentage, adopted by Ranslow and Mary Smith in Jefferson County, New York. This could be told from multiple perspectives across time, weaving the 1839 adoption with the modern-day DNA discovery suggesting a connection to Isaac and Rosina Lanfear, capturing both the uncertainty he may have felt as a child and the resolution his descendants eventually found through genetic genealogy.
2. An Act of the Legislature: The story of Devier's formal 1866 petition to the Wisconsin State Senate to legally claim the Smith name as his adoptive father's heir, set against the backdrop of his adoptive mother's recent death and his father's will referring to him by both names. This narrative could dramatize the courtroom or legislative chamber scene, exploring themes of identity, belonging, and what it means to claim a family as truly one's own.
3. A Wedding on the Eve of War: A romantic tale of Devier and Abbie Vaux's courtship and marriage on April 4, 1861, just as the nation was splitting apart with the outbreak of the Civil War. This story could juxtapose the intimate joy of a young Wisconsin couple beginning their life together against the distant rumble of national catastrophe, asking how ordinary people built private happiness while history turned around them.
4. Two Small Graves: A poignant story centered on the deaths of Devier and Abbie's young children, Aggie (age two, in Iowa) and Lutie (age two, in Kansas), exploring how a pioneer family processed grief while continuing to move, work, and survive. This narrative could examine the resilience required of frontier parents who buried children in towns they would soon leave behind, never to visit the graves again.
5. The Restless Road West: An epic, multi-generational tale following the Smith family's repeated relocations—from Jefferson County, New York, to Wisconsin Territory, then Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, and finally Nebraska. This story could capture the rhythm of pioneer life itself: the packing of wagons, the selling of land, the starting over again and again, framing Devier as an embodiment of America's restless westward energy.
6. Liveryman and Trader: A business-focused narrative set in Concordia, Kansas, depicting Devier's rise as a livery stable owner and cattle trader during the boom years of the Kansas cattle towns, while his wife Abbie worked as a milliner and his daughters taught music. This story could explore the entrepreneurial hustle of a frontier family pooling multiple income streams, and the social world of a cattle-town livery stable as a hub of commerce and gossip.
7. Alone at Spring Ranch: A deeply personal story built around the Bible entry Devier wrote on November 10, 1889, describing himself alone at Spring Ranch in Cheyenne County while his family was scattered between California and Nebraska. This narrative could dwell on solitude, faith, and longing, imagining his days and nights on an isolated homestead, his reading of Scripture as both comfort and discipline, and the emotional toll of a marriage and family stretched across hundreds of miles.
8. No Roof to Cover Them: An adventure story recounting Devier and John Dunbar's early exploration of the Wano valley in Cheyenne County, Kansas, where the two men reportedly slept on open ground with no shelter. This tale could focus on the physical hardship and camaraderie of frontier scouting, the gamble of staking a claim on unproven land, and the optimism required to imagine a homestead where there was, as yet, nothing.
9. The Inventor's Workshop: A story imagining the practical ingenuity behind Devier's December 1885 patent for a harness rack, exploring how a working liveryman might have identified a problem in his daily business and tinkered toward a solution. This narrative could highlight the lesser-known inventive streak running through ordinary frontier entrepreneurs, men who solved problems not in laboratories but in barns and stables.
10. The Last Days at the St. Charles Hotel: A closing story depicting Devier's sudden illness and death from heart disease at the St. Charles Hotel in McCook in May 1894, including his funeral through the M.E. church and burial under the Ancient Order of United Workmen. This narrative could serve as a bookend to his life, gathering his family, his fraternal brothers, and the McCook community he'd helped build, reflecting on the arc from mysterious foundling to respected pioneer businessman.
Several of these (especially #1, #3, #7, and #8) could work well as first-person fictional pieces in Devier's or Abbie's voice, similar to the approach you've taken with other ancestors like Philip Jacob König.
Each of those suggestions could be a story about Devier's life and family. I have written several "historical fiction stories" about Devier's life and family in:
- Devier J. Smith's Life Memories - An AI-Assisted Memoir
- Ask AI: "Describe the Life Of the Devier Smith Family in 1886 in McCook, Nebraska"
- Ask AI: "Describe the Life of Devier J. Smith In Dodge County, Wisconsin in 1860"
- Ask AI: "Please Create a Dialogue Between Devier Smith and His Wife About the Hair Tonic Ad'"
I may do several of the suggested stories for Devier J. Smith as time passes.
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