Our story
Genealogy isn't a hobby for us. It's a calling.
We started Keystone Ancestry because we know firsthand what it feels like to find an ancestor — and we believe every family deserves that moment.
How we began
This work chose us as much as we chose it
I still remember the afternoon I found my great-grandmother's name in a ship manifest — her handwriting, her age listed wrong by two years, the port she left from in County Cork. I sat in that archive for a long time afterward, just holding the photocopy. That feeling — of a life suddenly becoming real across a century of silence — is why I do this work. It's why all of us do.
Keystone Ancestry grew from that conviction: that every family has a story worth finding, and that finding it changes something in you. Our team came together from archives, universities, and local history centers across three continents — each of us drawn to genealogy not as a pastime but as a purpose. We've spent careers learning where records hide, how to read them, and how to follow a thread even when it seems to vanish.
We've helped thousands of families now. Some come to us with a shoebox of old photographs and a handful of names. Others have half-finished trees and a brick wall they've been staring at for years. Every single project still gives us that same feeling — the quiet thrill of a name emerging from the past, and the privilege of handing it to the family it belongs to.
What drives us
Our mission
"Every person who ever lived deserves to be remembered. We exist to make sure your family's story — all of it, however far back it goes — is found, documented, and passed forward."
Honesty
We tell you what we find — and what we don't. Some records are lost forever, and we'll never fill that silence with guesswork.
Precision
Every finding is cited, every source verified. We hold our work to the same standards as the historians and archivists we learned from.
Care
Family history is deeply personal. We handle every discovery — joyful or difficult — with the sensitivity it deserves.
Reach
We've spent decades building access to archives across 47+ countries. We go where the records are, however far that takes us.
Our network
The archives and databases we access
Over decades of research, we've built working relationships with archives, history centers, and database providers across the globe. This network is what allows us to go further than most.
North America
- National Archives and Records Administration (NARA)
- FamilySearch — LDS Church records network
- Ancestry.com historical collections
- Freedmen's Bureau Records
- State vital records offices across all 50 states
British Isles & Ireland
- The National Archives (Kew, England)
- General Register Office (England & Wales)
- National Records of Scotland
- General Register Office for Ireland
- National Library of Ireland — parish registers
Europe
- Archion & Matricula — German and Austrian church records
- Ancestry.com European collections
- Polish State Archives network
- FamilySearch Eastern European collections
- Geneanet — French and European records
Global & Specialist
- FindMyPast — international newspaper and record archives
- MyHeritage — global family tree and record matching
- DNA platforms: AncestryDNA, 23andMe, FamilyTreeDNA, MyHeritage DNA
- Caribbean and Latin American civil registration archives
- Regional history centers across 47+ countries
Ready to start your search?
Whether you have a shoebox of old photographs or a half-finished family tree, we'll take it from there.
Get Started Here