Board Thread:WARNING ALL USERS False Info\Spoilers/@comment-11835613-20130906143137/@comment-1587802-20130906202814

I think that Derek's father was a human, and that's why he hasn't been explored - he's not that important to the story.

The explanation to why there were humans in the Hale house is that I think when a human and a werewolf reproduce, some offspring become werewolves, and others become humans. It's been a reoccuring theme throughout the show that being a werewolf isn't for everyone (humans bitten that don't transform, die) and I think that in the same way that if you're not "meant" to be a werewolf, the bite kills you (Paige in 308), if you're not "meant" to be a werewolf, you get born as a human.

I don't think that the Hale family is necessarily matriarchial, it just so happened that Talia was the Hale Alpha and that she married a human. Because the Hale pack is made of family members and Talia was the Alpha, it makes sense that the rest of the family would take on her last name, to keep the family going, so to speak. That explains why Talia and Peter are sisters (said by Peter in 312) yet Derek has Talia's last name, not his father's (like most traditional modern families nowadays).