University of Arkansas David and Barbara Pryor Center for Arkansas Oral and Visual History Pryor Center logo

Profiles: George Haley
Map of Arkansas with Pine Bluff highlighted

George Williford Haley was born in Henning, Tennessee, on August 28, 1925.  He was raised in Pine Bluff, Jefferson County, Arkansas.

Haley served in the U.S. Army Air Corps.  In 1949 he graduated from Morehouse College in Atlanta.  He became the second black student to graduate from the University of Arkansas Law School in 1952.  After graduation, Haley joined a law firm in Kansas City, Kansas, and became involved in politics.  There he served as deputy city attorney and Republican state senator.

Haley has served in seven national presidential administrations since 1969.  In 1990 he was appointed chairman of the U.S. Postal Rate Commission.  From 1998 to July 2001 he served as U.S. Ambassador to Gambia.