Henry Louis Gates

Henry Louis Gates Jr.
Gates with his Peabody Award for his documentary, The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross
Born	(1950-09-16) September 16, 1950 (age 66) Keyser, West Virginia, U.S.
Occupation	Author, documentary filmmaker, essayist, literary critic, professor
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Yale University (B.A.) Clare College, Cambridge (Ph.D.)
Genre	Essay, history, literature
Subject	African American Studies
Spouse	Sharon Lynn Adams (m. 1979; div. 1999)
Children	2

Henry Louis "Skip" Gates Jr. (born September 16, 1950, in Keyser, West Virginia) is an American literary critic, teacher, historian, filmmaker and public intellectual who currently serves as the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and Director of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University. He has discovered what are considered the first books by African-American writers, both of them women, and has published extensively on appreciating African-American literature as part of the Western canon.

In addition to producing and hosting previous series on the history and genealogy of prominent American figures, since 2012 Gates has been host for three seasons of the series Finding Your Roots on PBS. It combines the work of expert researchers in genealogy, history, and genetics historic research to tell guests about their ancestors' lives and histories.

Gates was born in Keyser, West Virginia, to Henry Louis Gates, Sr. and his wife Pauline Augusta (Coleman) Gates. He grew up in neighboring Piedmont. His father worked in a paper mill and moonlighted as a janitor, while his mother cleaned houses, as described in his memoir Colored People (1994).

He has learned through contemporary research that his family is descended in part from the Yoruba people in the present-day country of Benin. He also has European ancestry, and is connected to the distinctive multiracial West Virginia community of the Chestnut Ridge people. He is also of part Irish descent.

At the age of 14 Gates was injured playing touch football, fracturing the ball and socket joint of his hip, resulting in a slipped capital femoral epiphysis. The injury was misdiagnosed by a physician, who told Gates' mother that his problem was psychosomatic. When the physical damage finally healed, his right leg was two inches shorter than his left. Because of the injury, Gates now uses a cane to help him walk.