How it works: Enter a National Archives catalog ID (NAID) for a Revolutionary War pension file,
and this tool will download every page image, send each one to AI for transcription,
then compile everything into a downloadable Word document and page-image PDF.
You will need:
• A
NARA Catalog API key (free — email
Catalog_API@nara.gov)
• An AI API key for transcription: either
Anthropic (
console.anthropic.com) or
Google Gemini (
aistudio.google.com)
Privacy: Your API keys are sent only to their respective services and are never stored on this server.
💰 Cost note: Each pension file costs roughly $0.05–$0.50 in API credits depending on pages and model. The NARA API is free.