Roots and Rivers Database
A searchable record of our people, our places, and the stories that connect them.
*You can find more information about this project at my website www.LeonardBruce.com
What is the project?
The Roots and Rivers Database is a searchable index of stories and names pulled from past Gila River newspapers. It uses Airtable to organize and connect people, events, and stories across time — kind of like a community lookup tool or Newspapers.com. If you’re looking for an ancestor, a story from your village, or want to know what someone was doing in the 1930s, this is the place to start.
So far I have most of my collection of the Gila River News (~1960’s) and some of the Pima Gazette (~1930’s) in the system. If you want to see which issues, they are the hearted issues on my Gila River News Database.
Why This Name (Roots and Rivers)?
The name "Roots & Rivers Ancestor Database" embodies the community's history and the flow of our collective memory. I started with “Member Database” then “Ancestor Database” and both seemed… off. I don’t know all of these people, some of them are our ancestors and some are tribal members but I don’t know well enough to seperate.
And I don’t know if it really matters. All of these people are part of our shared legacy - so I went with a fancy name -
Roots represent our deep connections to our ancestors, our traditions, and the earth that has sustained us for generations. Our Himdag.
Rivers represent the Gila River, the lifeblood of our community, and the continuous flow of our history and stories through time.
This project is all about the commitment to preserving and celebrating the legacy of those who came before us.
This database serves as a tribute to the individuals who have shaped our community:
* Celebrating the contributions of community members past and present
* Facilitating family history research and genealogical discoveries
* Strengthening our sense of identity and connection to our shared history
Why did I do it?
This project came out of the work I was already doing with the Gila River News Database. I realized that beyond tracking the issues themselves, we needed a way to search inside the papers — especially to follow the stories of our people.
Reading through the issues of the Gila River News, I started noticing a lot of names that I knew — either from growing up in San Tan or from my work with the Community at the Veterans and Family Services Office. It was super cool to me to see stories of these folks I’ve known my whole life when they were younger - some doing important work for the Community, some with simple stories about taking part in 4H club or being part of the early Mulch planning.
I wanted to be able to find individuals and see the different moments they showed up— whether it was getting an award, writing a letter, joining a club, or running for office. These moments matter. They show the shape of someone’s life. And they give us a better way to remember and reconnect.
And, I’ll also admit there was some selfish family history work in here as well, I wanted to see if and when my own family showed up in these papers.
What’s the goal?
The main goal is to make our community’s stories searchable. I wanted to build something that made it easier to find people—not just in one article, but across time.
It’s also a tool for families, educators, etc. Whether you’re trying to trace a family tree, build a classroom lesson, or just satisfy your curiosity about local history, this is meant to help you explore.
For my own purposes, it worked! I was able to find a bunch of references to both immediate and distant family in here that has started a lot of really fun conversations and helped me build some pretty cool family history projects.
How should you use this?
Start with a name.
See where it leads.
You can search by individual, by year, by issue, or scroll through the stories listed.
Want to know what was happening in 1939? Go for it. Want to look up your grandma and see where she popped up in the paper? Even better.
This isn’t just about genealogy—it’s about context. It’s about putting the pieces of our story back together in a way that helps us see the whole.
A Note on Respecting the Past
One thing I’ve thought a lot about while working on this project is our traditional beliefs around death — especially the practice of not naming those who have passed. I know that, in our culture, there’s sometimes a hesitation to speak or write the names of the dead. It’s a sign of respect. A way of letting them continue on without being called back.
At the same time, these newspapers are full of names — of people who shaped our Community, showed up in their villages, served, laughed, wrote letters, and lived full lives. In building this database, I’ve tried to hold both truths: that we honor our traditions, and that we also recognize the power of remembering.
This project isn’t about turning people into heroes or reducing them to single moments. It’s about tracing the threads of our lives — seeing how we showed up, again and again, in the pages of our own history.
If you choose to use this tool, I encourage you to do so with care. If you see the name of someone who has passed, take a breath. Remember them with kindness. And if you and your family want them removed, feel free to contact me through my website.
I can’t remove them from our public record, but I can work to remove them from my system with your family’s permission.
How did I do it?
Each page of each newspaper was done by hand. I started with OCR (optical character recognition) on the digital files to convert them into editable text. Then I cleaned up the pages—fixing typos, removing noise, and getting them ready to process.
From there, I used a local AI system to extract people’s names, summarize the stories, and tag the information. I pasted each cleaned page into the AI system, reviewed the results, and dropped the summaries and names into Airtable.
And yes—it took a while. But it worked.
Fun side note: one of my kids helped! I gave them the prompt and they processed a few dozen issues.
Yay child labor. (They were compensated, don’t worry.) But it was cool to be able to explain to them the process, have them read the names and articles, and it was fun to field questions about why the project is so important!
How long did it take?
Honestly? A lot of hours. I didn’t time it closely, but we’re easily in the hundreds. I did each page individually so I could try to catch errors, and while I didn’t catch everything, it was the best way to make sure it wasn’t completely automated and detached.
The help from my kids was welcome, but this was a lot of time hanging out watching Plex while I went through the data.
I also spent a lot of hours brainstorming the idea with my mentors and friends from the Community.
What are ways to make it better?
There’s still a lot to do:
Data cleanup: There are duplicate names, misspelled entries, and inconsistencies that need to be fixed.
More issues: I’ve only covered a portion of the total available newspapers so far. There’s plenty more to add. I’d love to finish the Pima Gazette’s and work on mining the PME and GRIN to expand the database.
Better search tools: Right now, Airtable works, but there’s room to make it more user-friendly or build a better front-end. I’m a data guy, not a design guy. If anyone is interested in creating a pretty front-end for me I’d be happy to chat!
Community input: If you see something wrong or know more about someone mentioned, I’d love to build a way for people to submit corrections or notes. Ohh, or even cooler would be a way to attach more information on a family member you want to share - photos, journals, historical items like that
Expand!!!!!: I also have a wild vision of expanding this database to include mentions of Community members from articles and books - I imagine scouring the OLL someday and helping families connect to the works of their ancestors.
This is 100% NOT a final product yet, but I figured since I’m releasing my Gila River News Database I should show this project to the world as well. Someday I’ll come back and clean it up!
Closing thoughts
This database is one small way to reconnect with our past. It’s not perfect—there are errors, gaps, and plenty more work to do—but it’s a start.
And what I love most is seeing the patterns. Watching a name appear in 1940 and again in 1968. Seeing kids who later became leaders. Finding stories I never would’ve known about if I hadn’t gone page by page. I was able to find places that my friends and family intersect through time - events they were both at, projects they took part in, and so on.
It’s history at the human level. And I hope it helps us remember who we are—and where we come from.
And that pretty much closes this chapter of the project, I look forward to coming back to it someday - and I hope I get some feedback from folks who access it.
Happy exploring!