Avoid Tunnel Vision, Check Collateral Lines

How often have you heard a fellow genealogist say, “We never spelled our surname that way!” Or perhaps this: “I’m only interested in doing genealogy on my direct line.” Sometimes you might even hear, “Our family has always lived in Missouri.” Once I even heard, “Why bother to find out about all those brothers and sisters - that could take forever!”

Family historians who say and believe these things are like work horses wearing blinders, limiting their vision to see only straight ahead. My advice is to take off those restrictive blinders, increase your peripheral vision and take another long look at the information you’ve already gathered onto your charts.

The timely topic of researching collateral relatives has been presented at many genealogy conferences in recent years. It’s only beginning genealogists who fail to realize the importance of gathering all possible information about every name they’ve collected from the very beginning of their research.

With experience comes the realization that not only can we learn more about our family by looking into the lives of everyone listed on a given chart, but that this is sometimes the only way to solve the next-generation-back problem.

Pamela Cook Spanogle, in a December 1980 article in Journal, a publication of the Western New York Genealogical Society, wrote that there are two types of relationships between any two related individuals.

The first is the lineal relationship: parent-child, parent-grandparent, etc. These people are called direct-line relatives. The direct line is divided into ancestors and descendants.

The other type of kinship is the collateral relationship, in which people are related because they share a common ancestor. A collateral relationship can be as close as brothers and sisters or as distant as 13th cousins.

It quickly becomes apparent that any individual has potentially far more collateral relatives than direct-line relatives.

Research should always begin with the direct line. But after the easy, direct and obvious sources have been exhausted, researchers should not give up. Other clues must be looked for and the most obvious next sources. Usually, the easiest to find are records on collateral ancestors. Brothers and sisters share certain common properties - the same parents, the same cousins, the same ancestors, often the same birthplaces and the same religion.

It was not uncommon for families to live in the same area and migrate together to new counties.

Spanogle urged genealogists to stop regarding collateral lines as just some extra names filling in the spaces on otherwise blank charts.

Collateral relatives are targets of opportunity and are every bit as important a resource as wills, deeds and the vital records we look for every day.

Does any reader have a story to share of finding a direct-line ancestor by digging into the life of a collateral relative? If so, I’d be pleased to have them. Send them to me in care of this paper.

Foreign birth, death records

Do you need to obtain birth or death records of a person who lived outside the United States? Most, but not all, foreign countries record births and deaths and most countries will provide certifications occurring within their boundaries.

To receive a copy of a foreign birth or death record, contact the American embassy consulate of the country in question. Addresses and telephone numbers for these offices are listed in the U.S. Department of State Publication 7846, “Foreign Consular Offices in the United States,” available in many local libraries. Copies may also be bought from the U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington DC, 20402.

If the embassy or consulate is unable to help, American citizens may obtain assistance by writing to the Office of Overseas Citizens Services, U.S. Department of State, Washington DC, 20520.

Between 1871 and 1910, more than 2.3 million people from the Russian Empire emigrated to the United States; some 600,000 between 1871 and 1898; and 1.7 million between 1899 and 1910. Several nationalities or ethnic groups were represented in this migration: Poles, Ukrainians, Jews, Finns, Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians and Germans (the so-called Volga Germans).

While this extraordinary migration has been documented, there has never been an account, by name, of those who were swept along in this floodtide of immigration. However, with the expertise and resources of the Temple-Balch Center for Immigration Research in Philadelphia, such documentation is now possible - and available in printed form.

Genealogical Publishing Co. recently published the first two volumes of a series of books that lists passengers arriving at the port of New York from the Russian Empire.

Volume 1 spans the time period January 1875 to September 1882, and Volume 2 covers October 1882 to April 1886. Together, these two volumes contain data on 105,000 persons of Russian nationality who emigrated to the U.S. from Russian territories.

Both customs passengers lists and immigrations passengers lists are represented in the books, and information on each person can include name, age, occupation, country of origin, place of residence and destination.

The books ($60 each) may be ordered from GPC at (800) 296-6687. They would be a dandy addition to any Pacific Northwest genealogy library since this area became home to thousands of Volga Germans.

If you have Russian ancestry, Jonathan D. Shea’s book will be of interest. “Russian Language Documents from Russian Poland: A Translation Manual for Genealogists” is a 73-page book covering several subjects in depth: Polish Provinces of the Russian Empire; the Russian alphabet; structure of Polish and Russian languages; expressions of time, date and age; birth, death and marriage records; and translating miscellaneous Russian government documents.

Order this book for $14.50, postpaid, from Genealogy Unlimited, 789 S. Buffalo Grove Rd., Buffalo Grove, IL 60089-3607, or by phone at (800) 666-4363.

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The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Donna Potter Phillips The Spokesman-Review