This month the MyHeritage online genealogy service announced that it was offering two new tools:
- “AI Record Finder™ revolutionizes genealogy like ChatGPT revolutionized searching the internet: it is an interactive, intelligent, free-text chat to help the user locate relevant historical records about a person of interest in MyHeritage’s vast database of 20 billion records.”
- “AI Biographer™ automatically compiles a rich narrative about an individual’s life using information from historical records that match the person, creating a Wikipedia-like biography about anyone. Narratives are enriched with relevant historical context using AI and are easy to share.”
I decided to evaluate these tools, using for case studies two of my relatives:
- Jane Champion Crespigny (1766 – 1785), my fourth great grand aunt
- James Kenneth Cudmore (1867 – 1948), my second great granduncle
I reviewed the results for Jane in an earlier post. This post concerns the results for James Kenneth Cudmore born 29 December 1867. James was the eldest son of my great great grandparents James Francis Cudmore (1837 – 1912) and Margaret (Budge) Cudmore (1845 – 1912).
With access to several large databases of material relevant to Australians born in the nineteenth century, MyHeritage’s “AI Record Finder” had more successful discoveries for James Cudmore than Jane Crespigny.
I used the results to develop James’s profile. I also used the MyHeritage search function without the help of a chatbot to find additional records. I doubt that the AI was more effective than the existing search function.
After updating James’s profile I generated a narrative using the new “AI Biographer” tool.
The first part of the report lists his life dates, parents, siblings, wife, and children.
A brief biography follows:
James Kenneth Cudmore was born on December 29, 1867, at 'Claremont', Glen Osmond, South Australia [1]. He was the son of James Francis Cudmore, who was born on October 11, 1837, between Launceston & Adelaide, South Australia, aboard the ship 'Siren' [1], and Margaret Cudmore (born Budge), whose birth took place on October 22, 1845, in Wick, Caithness, Scotland [1].
James Kenneth grew up with a large family, having twelve siblings: Margaret Jane, Arthur Murray, Violet Mary, Kenneth De Lacy, Dorothea Nevill, Thomas Cecil, Rosa Florence, Daniel Cashel, Alexandrina Budge, Mary Jane, Mary Paringa, and Robert Milo [1][2].
At the age of 26, he married Alice Eliza May on March 28, 1894, in St Peter's, Glenelg, South Australia [1]. Together they had four children: Amy Margaret, James Francis, Milo Morphett, and Hurtle Morphett [1].
James Kenneth Cudmore worked as a pastoralist [2] and lived in Mosman, New South Wales, Australia [2].
He passed away on April 28, 1948, at the age of 80, in Mosman, New South Wales, Australia [1][2]. He was buried in Northern Suburbs Memorial Gardens and Crematorium, North Ryde, New South Wales, Australia [1][2].
Two sources were cited:
- Source: Young and Ch de Crespigny, managed by Anne Young https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-1-359061001-15-358/james-kenneth-cudmore-in-myheritage-family-trees
- Source: Geni World Family Tree collection on MyHeritage https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-40000-351193467/james-kenneth-cudmore-in-geni-world-family-tree
Geni.com is a collaborative online tree and an American commercial genealogy and social networking website, founded in 2006. It was acquired by MyHeritage in November 2012. As of 2023, MyHeritage has kept its genealogical website separate from Geni’s website. Geni is one of several major collaborative trees. Others are FamilySearch and Wikitree.
I found the citations disappointing as I had attached numerous records from the MyHeritage database to the profile and I would have liked to have seen the biography developed using these records with those records being cited directly in the report.
The report continued with a section on Historical Context:
James Kenneth Cudmore was born into a period of colonial expansion in Australia. His birth on December 29, 1867, at 'Claremont', Glen Osmond, South Australia, came just three decades after the establishment of South Australia as a British province in 1836. The colony was unique for being freely settled rather than established as a penal colony. James's father, James Francis Cudmore, arrived aboard the ship 'Siren' during this pioneering era, symbolizing the influx of settlers seeking new opportunities. Margaret Cudmore (born Budge), his mother, emigrated from Scotland, representing the significant Scottish contribution to Australian settlement.
Growing up with twelve siblings, James Kenneth experienced life in a large family, typical of the Victorian era where high birth rates were common. This demographic trend contributed to rapid population growth in Australia, which by the late 19th century had developed an economy heavily reliant on agriculture and pastoralism, sectors that would later define James Kenneth's career.
In 1894, when James Kenneth married Alice Eliza May, Australia was undergoing significant social changes.The nation was moving towards federation, which would occur seven years later in 1901, uniting the six colonies under one federal government. This period saw the emergence of national identity and progress,within which James Kenneth raised his four children.
As a pastoralist, James Kenneth Cudmore participated in an industry vital to Australia's development. Pastoral leases covered vast areas of the continent, and wool production became a cornerstone of the economy. By the time he moved to Mosman, New South Wales, Australia was transitioning from its rural, colonial roots towards urbanization and industrialization, particularly following World War I and leading into the interwar period.
James Kenneth Cudmore passed away on April 28, 1948, in Mosman, New South Wales, at the age of 80. His death occurred in post-World War II Australia, a time marked by reconstruction, immigration, and the beginning of the long economic boom that would transform the country. He was laid to rest in Northern Suburbs Memorial Gardens and Crematorium, North Ryde, New South Wales, reflecting the shift from traditional burials to cremations, a practice that gained acceptance in Australia throughout the 20th century.
I thought this section was well put together for something automatically generated. The narrative concerning settlement, pastoralism, transitioning towards urbanisation, and on the rise of cremations was pertinent.
I dislike the phrase “passed away” and prefer the more straightforward “died”.
My husband Greg, whose willingness to entertain novel ideas was already showing signs of rigor mortis three-quarters of a century ago, offered his opinion on MyHeritage’s AI-generated biography with characteristic moderation:
“As with the crudely fabricated biography of Jane Crespigny, MyHeritage’s sketch of the life and times of James Cudmore is a disgraceful fraud and an insult to the reader’s intelligence.
“Designed to mine scholarship and appropriate and re-shuffle commonplace opinion on historical matters, the AI squeezes out platitude upon platitude in turgid prose like a butcher making sausages, plop plop plop. The recipe is simple: find a plausible historical context for a person’s actions and announce, breathless with excitement at the discovery, that he had a place in it. In 1914 Joe Blow found himself caught up in one of the great historical upheavals of the twentieth century. He joined the Army. Mick O’Brien, short of spuds, emigrated to Australia in search of a better life, like countless others at the time.
“The scheme employs boiler-plated historical factoids as a cheap substitute for a careful survey of the period and Cudmore’s place in it, with no attempt made to weigh and consider the nature and causes of the historical trends to which he was exposed and to which he supposedly contributed.
“Take the first paragraph. Cudmore was born ‘into a period of colonial expansion’, says the sausage-machine. But wasn’t everyone born in this period born in it? How was Cudmore different? His birth came ‘just’—what does this imply?—three decades after South Australia was established as a British province. So what? And as for free settlement, that was the idea with the Swan River too, wasn’t it? How did James Cudmore’s arrival on the ‘Siren’ symbolise (what?) the influx of settlers seeking new opportunities. That is what new settlers do. They seek new opportunities. And how did his mother’s emigration from Scotland ‘represent’ the Scottish contribution and how and why should it be considered ‘significant’?
“In the next paragraph, the AI boiler-plates Cudmore into a large family, large because of high birth-rates don’t you know, and Jim finds himself farming, rather than developing a career in car manufacturing, say, or aeronautical engineering.
“Quite soon afterwards, James Kenneth, now too busy for a surname, is undergoing significant (?) social changes, forging national identity, creating economic progress, moving towards federation (which, we are told, united separate colonies under one government—well, it would, wouldn’t it?) and simultaneously raising four children.
“Then, after that, with wool a cornerstone, Australia transitioned from its vast roots, especially after WW1, and in Mosman Cudmore genteelly ‘passed away’.
“No doubt in his headlong rush through History James Cudmore came across a certain amount of fraudulent non-scholarship and bad prose. At least he was spared AI.”
My daughter commented more broadly “The automatically written biography is more akin to a fill in the blanks system than a truly AI generated biography. This is a good thing as true machine learning generated text is unconcerned with facts. In order to maximise the result of the automatically written biography choose a subject that there is a lot of information about. This will give it more to work with.”
Last Name Origins
The surname Cudmore is of Anglo-Saxon origin, derived from the Old English personal name 'Cuthmaer',which means 'famous battle'. It is a compound of two elements: 'cuth', meaning 'famous', and 'maer', meaning ‘battle' or 'fame'. The surname likely originated as a patronymic, indicating 'son of Cuthmaer'. Over time, it evolved into its modern form, Cudmore. This surname is particularly associated with Devon in England, where the family held a seat as Lords of the Manor after the Norman Conquest.
The origin of the name Cudmore was new to me. I have not verified it.
Consistency Issues
- Place of Birth: ‘Claremont’, Glen Osmond, South Australia [1] vs River Murray, SA, Australia [2]
- Father’s Place of Birth: In ship ‘Siren’ btwn Launceston & Adelaide, South Australia[1] vs At Sea[2]
- Mother’s Place of Birth: Wick, Caithness, Scotland[1] vs Caithness, Wick, Scotland, United Kingdom[2]
- Number of Children: Four children[1] vs one son mentioned [2]
The consistency issues are valid but explainable. The first source is my tree at MyHeritage, the second source is a tree at Geni.com
- A newspaper birth notice gives his place of birth as “Claremont”, Glen Osmond, a Cudmore family home. The birth was registered in Adelaide, South Australia as being the “Murray River”. I am more inclined to trust the newspaper notice than the birth registration. I have not seen an original copy of the registration, only an index.
- At sea and naming the ship and the voyage between Launceston and Adelaide are both consistent.
- Wick is a town in Caithness, the latter variation is not a standard format for the placename.
- Listing only one son is incomplete, the geni.com profile at https://www.geni.com/people/James-Cudmore/6000000047905402832 in fact lists two other sons but they are marked as private, presumably because their death details have not been entered. James’s daughter Amy, who never married, is not recorded at geni.com.
There is a comprehensive obituary in the Longreach Leader of 14 May 1948 which gives much detail on his business and sporting interests. Comparing this obituary with the brief report generated by the MyHeritage AI Biographer™ highlights that a mere recitation of births, marriages, deaths, and listing of relatives gives very little insight into anyone’s life.
As with my review of the results of using the tools to research Jane Champion Crespigny, I was pleased to find the tools did not provide false information. I look forward to the tools being further developed and providing more useful results. While they provide a starting point for research, I do not think at present these tools are a substitute for a comprehensive review of sources and manually pulling together biographies.
Related posts and further reading
- Review of new MyHeritage AI features for genealogy
- Don’t trust chatbots
- Q is for questing in Queensland
- OBITUARY (1948, May 14). The Longreach Leader (Qld. : 1923 – 1954), p. 21. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article125218177
Wikitree: James Kenneth Cudmore (1867 – 1948)