Josephine Baker—an Advocate for Racial Justice and Freedom

 

On Tuesday, November 30, Josephine Baker was inducted into the Panthéon in Paris, an honor reserved for French heroes and notables like Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Victor Hugo, Èmile Zola, Marie Curie, and Jean Moulin (French resistance fighter). A coffin containing soils from the U.S., France, and Monaco—places where Baker made her mark—was carried by French military pallbearers down a long, red carpet to the monument. The pallbearers stopped several times along the way for multi-media presentations that played Baker’s songs and highlighted her achievements. Then, before the coffin entered the Panthéon, a luminary display was projected onto the monument to tell her life story.

 

The event was planned by French President Emmanuel Macron who embraced a petition not only to give homage to an exceptional figure in French history, but to send an anti-racism message to all of France.

“She embodies, before anything, women’s freedom,” said Laurent Kupferman, author of the petition in an Associated Press interview.

 

What Josephine Baker means for Americans, however, is the embodiment of the spirit of racial justice and freedom, persistence in following one’s dream, and an illustration of what one person can do to make a difference in the world.

 

Initially, all Missouri-born Josephine Baker (née Freda Josephine McDonald in 1906) wanted to do was sing and dance. She got her start in show business on the streets of St. Louis and then joined a Southern vaudeville circuit called the Dixie Steppers. She became a teenage chorus girl in the 1921 production of “Shuffle Along”, which led to subsequent work with the Chocolate Dandies in 1924.

 

However, Baker was denied greater opportunities not for a lack of talent but because of the color of her skin. Undaunted, she moved to Europe at age 19 where she not only found work, but acquired fame, fortune, and love. She even lived in a castle and was a frequent guest of other famous entertainers and elite families including Princess Grace of Monaco!

 

Starting in the 1920’s she danced and sang in cabarets in Munich and Berlin and was a stupendous hit. Her dancing was considered exotic and exciting, unlike anything ever seen before after she was told to do something “tribal,” “savage,” and “African-like.” For her, it was a blend of Southern jazz with comedic steps and bizarre facial expressions--which were a totally-conscious mocking of the colonial biases of her audiences. Her costume consisted of a banana skirt, a skimpy top (sometimes not), and a beaded necklace topped off with a short, slicked-down haircut. However, when the Nazis took over the German government, their discriminatory policies prevented the Black dancing girl from performing. So, Baker went to Paris where she was wildly accepted both for her color and her performances.

 

She continued as a singer and dancer in Paris and later in the United States where she appeared at Carnegie Hall and on Broadway. Her last performance was on April 8, 1975, and four days later she died of a brain hemorrhage. She was buried in Monaco where her body remains today.

 

In one of her 1930 performances at the Casino de Paris, she sang what would become her most famous song: “J’ai Deux Amours” (I have two loves) where she posed as an African native girl torn between Paris and Africa since French colonist, played by Adrien Lamy, wanted to take her back with him to France. Later this song was interpreted as her life between the U.S. and France.

 

She returned to the United States and was contracted to perform for segregated audiences while she was also denied access to hotels and restaurants because she was Black. However, later, as her star grew, she stipulated that unless her audiences were composed of Black as well as white patrons, she would not show up. The theatre managements capitulated.

In 1937, she became a French citizen after her marriage to French industrialist Jean Lion. By then, she was known as an international entertainer, and she could speak five languages.

 

In 1939 after France and Britain declared war against Nazi Germany, she volunteered to serve as an ambulance driver and later as a spy for the French Resistance by traveling, getting close to officials, and sharing information hidden on her music sheets, according to French military archives. Researcher and historian Géraud Létang said Baker risked the death penalty or the harsh repression of the Vichy regime in order to live “a double life between, on the one side, the music hall artist, and on the other side, another secret life, later becoming completely illegal, of intelligence agent.”

 

In 1940, her operations included inviting several spies into her troupe to work for the Allies, which allowed them to travel to Spain and Portugal. She also gathered intelligence for General Charles De Gaulle in North Africa.

 

She also raised 10 million euros ($11.2 million) to support the French Resistance and organized concerts for soldiers and civilians near combat zones. After the defeat of the Nazis, she went to Germany to sing for former prisoners and deportees freed from the camps.

 

 

 

The French recognized her courageous and generous contributions to the war effort by awarding her several French military honors, including the Croix de Guerre. She was the first American-born woman to receive this honor.

 

After the war she adopted 12 children from different countries, races, and religions to show that diversity could be an avenue toward “universal fraternity”. She called her family the “Rainbow Tribe” and purchased a castle in the southwestern French town of Castelnaud-la-Chapelle in the Dordogne region to house them. When she ran into financial trouble and lost her properties, she received support from Princess Grace of Monaco, who offered Baker a place for her and her children to live.

As the Civil Rights Movement in the USA emerged, she fought against segregation and was named Woman of the Year by the NAACP in 1951. However, during a performance tour of the U.S., she became a target of the FBI, was labeled a communist, and was banned from her homeland for a decade. President John F. Kennedy lifted the ban in 1963 just in time for her to attend the March on Washington where Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech. She was the only woman to speak that day, which she called “the happiest day of my life.” She wore her French Air Force uniform with all her medals pinned to her chest. It was a stunning moment for the Civil Rights Movement.

 

Josephine Baker showed what one woman could do in the fight for liberty and justice for all people. France has consistently showed its appreciation for her endeavors--and the United States should, too!