Collateral Lines

Or "Rednecks, Hocking the Truck & Winning Ideas"

by Uncle Hiram

REPRINTED WITH PERMISSION

The other day I was sitting in the local Dairy Queen (Yes, I hang out in there a lot), munching on French fries and talking baseball with a couple of good old boys when I saw cousin Tyrel come tearing into the parking lot spraying gravel everywhere and scaring dogs. It was pretty apparent that someone or something had him all riled up. He came in, sat down in my booth and said "Hiram how come I gotta hock my truck to do genealogy?"

Now with most people I would figure either they were joking or they were trying to get my goat, but with cousin Tyrel you just never know. In spite of my misgivings I asked "Tyrel, what the devil are you talking about?"

"Well Hiram, I was in one of them chat rooms last night and the lady asked if Hocutt was my main line, an allied family or a collateral line. Now I enjoy doing this stuff but not enough to put up my truck as collateral. I just finished paying it off and its only 12 years old."

I gotta admit I had to laugh out loud. Then I set about explaining to my enthusiastic but somewhat confused cousin what the person meant.

1) A Direct (Main) or Lineal line would be your father, grandfather, great grandfather, etc. A direct parent to child line.

2) A collateral line means yall descend from the same ancestor but not in a direct line. For example My Great Great Great Grandfather was Edward Hocutt. I descend thru his son George, the descendants of Edward's son Richard would be a collateral line for me. It does not involve putting your truck up as collateral.

3) Allied Family means related usually through marriage. For example one of my collateral Hocutt lines married into the Wilder family of NC. The Wilders would be one of my Allied Families.

The only thing I would want to add is that Tryel is on a collateral line (GRIN). Seriously, I do want to give credit to Host GFS Kate of the Golden Gate Genealogy Forum for the simple explanation of the terms.

Next Time: Your guess is as good as mine at this point (GRIN).

- Adios and Keep Smiling!

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