Alex Haley, the most notable Black storyteller of this century, was born in Ithaca, New York and grew up in Henning, Tennessee. His writing came from growing up listening to his family's stories and oral history.

Haley served 20 years with the coast guard. It was in the coast guard that he started to write. His first big success was The Autobiography of Malcolm X. After he completed Malcolm X, he started what would become one of the century's great masterpieces of Black fiction. Roots: The Saga of an American Family took him 12 years to complete.

Roots sold over 8 million copies and millions of people saw the television mini-series. Alex Haley brought the realities of slavery to the forefront of the public consciousness.