Alex Haley, better known as Alexander Murray Palmer Haley (August 11, 1921 – February 10, 1992), was an American writer and author of the 1976 book Roots: The Saga of an American Family, which explores Black American history. ABC adapted the book as a television miniseries of the same name and broadcast it in 1977 to a record-breaking audience of 130 million viewers. In the United States, the book and the miniseries raised public awareness of Black American history and inspired widespread interest in genealogy and family history.
Halley’s first book, a biography of Malcolm X, published in 1965, was a collaboration through numerous lengthy interviews with the subject, a Black Muslim intellectual and icon.
He was working on a second history of the family at the time of his death. Haley asked David Stevens, a screenwriter, to complete it; the book was published as The Queen: The Story of an American Family. It was adapted into a miniseries, Alex Haley Quinn, which aired in 1993.
Halley traced his maternal ancestry, through genealogical research, to Govorit.