Josephine Baker is high on the list of historical divas, somewhere in between Cleopatra and Liz Taylor. While she may be best known for her banana skirt and fierce shimmy, Miss Baker's story is rich with heroism and intrigue.
Baker was born Freda Josephine McDonald to a poor family in St Louis, Missouri in 1906. After dropping out of school at 12 she began dancing on the streets for money. It was not long before she began working as a chorus girl in the city's vaudeville theaters. At 15 she married Willie Baker whom she left two years later when she ran off to New York in an effort to escape the intense racial discrimination she faced in Missouri.
In New York Baker found friends in the other artists and performers of the Harlem Renaissance and danced in the first major African American Broadway musical Shuffle Along. It was there that her comedic persona was developed. As the last dancer in the chorus line Baker would fumble about, engaging the audience with flirty winks and rolled eyes throughout the performance. The spectators adored her bumbling beauty shtick and she soon became a box office hit.
Josephine hams it up. Look at those legs!
In 1925 Baker relocated to Paris to begin working in La Revue Negre, a move which would forever change Baker's destiny. There, in the European capital, she discovered a level of acceptance and fame unattainable in the United States. Baker and dance partner Joe Alex won over the French audience with their exotic Danse Sauvage which featured a nearly nude Baker, boldly dressed in little more than feathers, shimmying in a wild frenzy. The new act was a hit and she was an overnight success. Soon she was headlining La Folie du Jour at the famous Folies Bergère Theater where her sensational dances and scandalous costumes quickly made her a celebrity.
The infamous banana skirt.
In 1935 Baker returned to the US to star in the Ziegfeld Follies but despite her European success she was not well received. Close minded American audiences rejected the idea of a powerful and sexy black woman dominating the stage and critics were especially harsh. She quickly returned to France where she married Frenchman Jean Lion and became a French citizen.
Baker had a variety of exotic pets. She often performed with her pet cheetah, Chiquita, who only occasionally escaped to terrorize the orchestra.
When the Nazis captured Paris in 1940 Baker left her adopted hometown, transitioning to her chateau in the south of France. However, always a spit fire, she was not content to sit and wait. She joined the Underground movement, smuggling messages written in invisible ink on her sheet music from France to Portugal. In addition, she worked as a pseudo-agent, reporting the news and gossip overheard at the fancy soirees she attended back to the French resistance. She also exercised her celebrity muscle to help get visas for people being persecuted by the Nazis. Knowing the power of a bright smile and a great pair of legs, Baker even persuaded King Farouk of Egypt to make an appearance at one of her concerts in a move that publicly showed which side his officially "neutral" country was on. France was grateful for their secret weapon and at the end of the war Baker was awarded several high military honors including the Croix de Guerre, the Rosette de la Résistance, and was made a Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur by General Charles de Gaulle.
Baker in her resistance uniform.
However, her fighting spirit was not appeased. In the 50s and 60s Baker became deeply involved in the Civil Rights Movement occurring in the US. She worked with the NAACP and publicly boycotted New York's famed Stork Club for their racist policies. In 1963 she spoke alongside Martin Luther King Jr. at the historic March on Washington as the only woman speaker of the protest.
Speaking at the March on Washington.
If you think Angelina and Madonna made international adoption trendy think again. In the 60s, Baker formed a family by adopting 12 multi-ethnic children, whom she called the Rainbow Tribe to prove that, "children of different ethnicities and religions could still be brothers."
Mama Baker and her "Rainbow Tribe."
In 1975 she performed a final revue in Paris. The sold-out performance financed by Jackie Onassis, Prince Rainer and his wife Grace Kelly was a huge hit and had a star studded guest list including Sophia Loren, Mick Jagger, Shirley Bassey, Diana Ross and Liza Minnelli. Several days later Baker died and was put to rest in the Cimetiére de Monaco.
Today we honor her vibrant personality and fighting spirit. Viva Josephine!
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