La Baker – Who was Josephine Baker?
A Report by Seneca
You can do a
Google search and bring up about
1,470,000
search results for Josephine Baker. There
is no shortage of information on and about her. There are biographies,
there are movies. There’s Josephine Baker as the dancer, Josephine as
the actress, Josephine as the singer, Josephine as the humanitarian and
Josephine as the muse.
Josephine Baker lived in a castle in France and was wined and dined by dignitaries and royalty. She had exotic pets. She was showered with diamonds and cars by her admirers. She had a clan of adopted children from all around the world which she called her “Rainbow Tribe.” She had come along way from living in a boxcar in St. Louis., Missouri. How did the young colored woman manage to become France’s most beloved and sensational figure in the early half of the 20th Century? Well it’s safe for you to assume that she did it all on shear will and determination because that’s just about the sum of it.
By her early teens she was already performing professionally on Broadway in shows like “Shuffle Along” and “Chocolate Dandies.” In 1925 she was on her way to Paris to perform with La Revue Negre. She became famous almost overnight for her dance in nothing but a banana skirt while starring at the Folies Bergère. She would go on to make records and act in movies soon after. She had become the most famous entertainer in France, a level of fame she would have never achieved in her native America because of her race. But in Paris Black was beautiful and they couldn’t get enough of it. France had embraced her and in turn she embraced France. Baker became a French citizen in 1937. She was quoted as saying “It [the Eiffel Tower] looked very different from the Statue of Liberty, but what did that matter? What was the good of having the statue without the liberty”?
During World War II she worked as a spy for the French Resistance against the German Nazis and would be decorated for her service to her country. Baker was deeply involved in Civil Rights and stood against the mistreatment of any man based on his race. She was the only woman to speak at the March on Washington alongside Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1963. She always adamantly refused to perform to segregated audiences at her shows in the U.S.
She toured the world with her shows until her death on April 12, 1975. She had just began a revue to celebrate her 50 years in entertainment. A couple nights after the revue began, she died in her sleep after a large party given in her honor. By the time of her death she had become a legend. 20,000 people filled the streets in Paris to watch her funeral procession.
Her legacy of entertainment and spirit of conquering objectives continues to have an impact on entertainment artists to this day. Just recently singer Beyoncé Knowles performed her song Déjà vu for the 2006 Fashion Rocks television program wearing a banana skirt while doing Baker-inspired dance moves as a tribute to and in celebration of the 100th year anniversary of Baker’s birth. If it’s said that La Baker opened doors for Black entertainers then it can certainly be said that she opened doors for women entertainers in general who seek to express themselves through their art openly and freely.