Josephine baker biography childhood

She transported the confidential information by writing with invisible ink on music sheets. After many years of performing in Paris, Baker returned to the United States. Her return home forced Baker to confront segregation and discrimination that she had not experienced since she was a child in St. She often refused to perform to segregated audiences, which usually forced club owners to integrate for her shows.

In , she was one of the few women allowed to speak at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Her speech detailed her life as a black woman in the United States and abroad:. And much more. But I could not walk into a hotel in America and get a cup of coffee, and that made me mad. Baker continued to fight racial injustices into the s. Her personal life was a testament to her political agenda.

Throughout her career, she adopted 13 children from various countries. Baker remained on stage late into her life and in she performed for the last time. The show was sold out and she received a standing ovation. Baker passed away on April 12, Page Talk. Read Change Change source View history. Tools Tools. In other projects. Wikimedia Commons Wikidata item.

Josephine Baker. Career [ change change source ]. Personal life [ change change source ]. References [ change change source ]. Louis, Missouri". In the s she moved to France and soon became one of Europe's most popular and highest-paid performers. She worked for the French Resistance during World War II , and during the s and '60s devoted herself to fighting segregation and racism in the United States.

After beginning her comeback to the stage in , Baker died of a cerebral hemorrhage on April 12, , and was buried with military honors. Louis, Missouri. Her mother, Carrie McDonald, was a washerwoman who had given up her dreams of becoming a music-hall dancer. Her father, Eddie Carson, was a vaudeville drummer. He abandoned Carrie and Josephine shortly after her birth.

Carrie remarried soon thereafter and would have several more children in the coming years. To help support her growing family, at age eight Josephine cleaned houses and babysat for wealthy white families, often being poorly treated. She briefly returned to school two years later before running away from home at age 13 and finding work as a waitress at a club.

While working there, she married a man named Willie Wells, from whom she divorced only weeks later. It was also around this time that Josephine first took up dancing, honing her skills both in clubs and in street performances, and by she was touring the United States with the Jones Family Band and the Dixie Steppers performing comedic skits.

In , Josephine married a man named Willie Baker, whose name she would keep for the rest of her life despite their divorce years later. I have unraveled many mysteries associated with Josephine Baker, but the most painful mystery of her life, the mystery of her father's identity, I could not solve. The secret died with Carrie, who refused to the end to talk about it.

She let people think Eddie Carson was the father, and Carson played along, but Josephine knew better. Louis, a racially mixed low-income area near Union Station, consisting mainly of rooming houses, brothels, and apartments without indoor plumbing. Her mother married Arthur Martin, "a kind but perpetually unemployed man", with whom she had a son and two more daughters.

I can still see myself standing on the west bank of the Mississippi looking over into East St. Louis and watching the glow of the burning of Negro homes lighting the sky. We children stood huddled together in bewilderment So with this vision I ran and ran and ran By age 12, she had dropped out of school. She also lived as a street child in the slums of St.

Louis, sleeping in cardboard shelters, scavenging for food in garbage cans, [ 25 ] making a living with street-corner dancing. It was at the Old Chauffeur's Club that Josephine met Willie Wells, whom she married at age 13, but the marriage lasted less than a year. Following her divorce from Wells, she found work with a street performance group called the Jones Family Band.

In her teens, she struggled to have a healthy relationship with her mother, who opposed her becoming an entertainer and scolded her for not tending to her second husband, William Howard Baker, whom she had married in , at age They divorced in , during a period when her career success was beginning. Still, she continued to use his last name professionally for the rest of her life.

Baker's unrelenting badgering of a local show manager led to her recruitment for the St. Louis Chorus vaudeville act. After several auditions, she secured a role in the chorus line of a touring production of the groundbreaking and hugely successful Broadway revue " Shuffle Along " [ 29 ] that helped bring public attention to Florence Mills, Paul Robeson , and Adelaide Hall.

In "Shuffle Along", Baker was a dancer at the end of a chorus line. Fearing she might be overshadowed by the others, she used her position to introduce a hint of comedy into her routine, making her stand out from her fellow dancers. She began in "Shuffle Along" with one of the U. Again, she was relegated to the chorus line. The show ran for 96 performances, finally closing in November In a interview with The Guardian , she explained that her first big break came in this bustling European city:.

I was only in the chorus in 'Shuffle Along' and 'Chocolate Dandies. I just couldn't stand America and I was one of the first coloured Americans to move to Paris. Oh yes, Bricktop was there as well. Me and her were the only two, and we had a marvellous time. Of course, everyone who was anyone knew Bricky. And they got to know Miss Baker as well.

In Paris, she became an instant success for her erotic dancing and for appearing practically nude onstage. Baker performed the Danse Sauvage , wearing little more than a skirt of strung-together artificial bananas. In later shows in Paris, she was often accompanied on stage by her pet cheetah , "Chiquita", donning a diamond collar. Chiquita frequently escaped into the orchestra pit , terrorizing the musicians and adding another element of excitement to the show.

After a while, Baker became the most successful American entertainer in France.

Josephine baker biography childhood

Ernest Hemingway called her "the most sensational woman anyone ever saw. Picasso depicted her alluring beauty. Jean Cocteau became friendly with her and helped vault her to international stardom. In , Baker became the first African-American star to visit Yugoslavia , which she included on a tour through Central Europe via the Orient Express.

In Belgrade , she performed at Luxor Balkanska, then the city's most luxurious venue. In a nod to local culture, she included a Pirot kilim in her routine, and donated some of the show's proceeds to poor children of Serbia. In Zagreb , adoring crowds greeted her at the train station, but opposition from local clergy and morality police led to the cancellation of some of her shows.

The two could not marry because she was not yet divorced from her second husband, Willie Baker. During this period, she released her most successful song, "J'ai deux amours" She starred in Fausse Alerte in Under the management of Abatino, Baker's stage and public persona, as well as her singing voice, were transformed. In preparation for her performances, she went through months of training with a vocal coach.

In the words of Shirley Bassey , who has cited Baker as her primary influence, " I swear in all my life I have never seen, and probably never shall see again, such a spectacular singer and performer. Despite her popularity in France , Baker never attained the equivalent reputation in America. Her star turn in a revival of " Ziegfeld Follies " on Broadway was not commercially successful, and later in the run she was replaced by Gypsy Rose Lee.

Baker returned to Paris in , married the French industrialist Jean Lion, and became a French citizen. Between and , Baker was a guest at the start of the Tour de France on four occasions. In , after enduring severe hostility in Germany and Eastern Europe during the late s—where she was targeted by storm troopers with ammonia bombs and told to "Go back to Africa"—Josephine Baker became a French citizen by marrying Jean Lion in This significant event in her life spurred her to actively participate in the French Resistance against the Nazis.

Baker worked with Jacques Abtey, the head of French counterintelligence in Paris. She socialized with the Germans at embassies, ministries, night clubs, charming them while secretly gathering information. She attended parties and gathered information at the Italian embassy without raising suspicion. She collected detailed intelligence on German troop movements, as well as the locations and activities of airfields and harbors.

Confident in her celebrity status and the protections it afforded, Baker believed she could operate without raising suspicion. To covertly transport sensitive information, she used ingenious methods, such as writing notes on her hands and arms, pinning them inside her clothing, and using invisible ink. Her boldness paid off, allowing her to smuggle intelligence across borders and deliver critical reports to the French Resistance.

Her estate also provided the center of resistance activities, including the installation of a radio transmitter in order to be in touch with the Allied forces and storing weapons in its cellar. She carried information for transmission to England, about airfields, harbors, and German troop concentrations in the West of France. Notes were written in invisible ink on Baker's sheet music.

Later in , she and her entourage went to the French colonies in North Africa. The stated reason was Baker's health since she was recovering from another case of pneumonia , but the real reason was to continue helping the Resistance. From a base in Morocco, she made tours of Spain. She pinned notes with the information she gathered inside her underwear.

She met the Pasha of Marrakech , whose support helped her through a miscarriage the last of several. After the miscarriage, she developed an infection so severe it required a hysterectomy. The infection spread and she developed peritonitis and then sepsis. After her recovery which she continued to fall in and out of , she started touring to entertain British, French, and American soldiers in North Africa.

The Free French had no organized entertainment network for their troops, so Baker and her entourage managed for the most part on their own. They allowed no civilians and charged no admission. Baker's last marriage, to French composer and conductor Jo Bouillon , ended around the time she adopted her 11th child. Bolstered by recognition of her wartime heroism, Baker the performer assumed a new gravitas, unafraid to take on serious music or subject matter.

The engagement was a rousing success and reestablished Baker as one of Paris' pre-eminent entertainers. In , Baker was invited back to the United States for a nightclub engagement in Miami. After winning a public battle over desegregating the club's audience, Baker followed up her sold-out run at the club with a national tour. Rave reviews and enthusiastic audiences accompanied her everywhere, climaxed by a parade in Harlem in honor of her new title: NAACP 's "Woman of the Year".

An incident at the Stork Club in October interrupted and overturned her plans. Baker criticized the club's unwritten policy of discouraging Black patrons, then scolded columnist Walter Winchell , an old ally, for not rising to her defense. Winchell responded swiftly with a series of harsh public rebukes, including accusations of Communist sympathies a serious charge at the time.

The ensuing publicity resulted in the termination of Baker's work visa, forcing her to cancel all her engagements and return to France. It was almost a decade before U. Her spectacular show in April broke attendance records. In , Baker visited Yugoslavia and made appearances in Belgrade and in Skopje. In her later career, Baker faced financial troubles.

She commented, "Nobody wants me, they've forgotten me"; but family members encouraged her to continue performing. In she performed at Carnegie Hall to a standing ovation. Advancing years and exhaustion began to take their toll; she sometimes had trouble remembering lyrics, and her speeches between songs tended to ramble. She still continued to captivate audiences of all ages.

When she arrived in New York with her husband Jo, they were refused reservations at 36 hotels because of racial discrimination. This led her to write several articles about segregation in the United States. The intent of doing so was to deter other countries from allowing her to take the stage. During her travels to foreign countries, she would leverage her influence to bring light to the racial discrimination in the United States which created a rift between her and her homeland.

On October 16, , Josephine Baker experienced a public incident where she was said to have been refused service at the upscale Stork Club in New York City. Determined to expose this injustice, Baker set out to publicize her story, expecting support from one of America's most powerful conservative journalists and one of the regulars at the club: Walter Winchell.

Instead of solidarizing with Baker, Winchell launched a media attack on her. He labeled her as an anti-American communist sympathizer, which turned the public attention away from the discrimination she had to face. This was an incident that proved that, on one hand, Baker faced racism, while on the other, influential people were also up against her efforts to fight against the same.

Undaunted by such opposition, she continued to use her platform to advocate for civil rights and challenge systemic injustice. Her insistence on mixed audiences helped to integrate live entertainment shows in the Las Vegas Valley. In , Baker made charges of racism against Sherman Billingsley 's Stork Club in Manhattan, where she had been refused service.

The two women became close friends after the incident. When Baker was near bankruptcy, Kelly—by then the princess consort —offered her a villa and financial assistance. He indicated that he had read his mother's FBI file and, using comparison of the file to the tapes, said he thought the Stork Club incident was overblown. The honor she was paid spurred her to further her crusading efforts with the " Save Willie McGee " rally.

McGee was a black man in Mississippi convicted of raping a white woman in on the basis of dubious evidence, and sentenced to death. In , she spoke at the March on Washington at the side of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. In her speech, one of the things Baker said:. I have walked into the palaces of kings and queens, and into the houses of presidents and much more.

But I could not walk into a hotel in America and get a cup of coffee, and that made me mad. And when I get mad, you know that I open my big mouth. And then look out, 'cause when Josephine opens her mouth, they hear it all over the world After King's assassination, his widow Coretta Scott King approached Baker in the Netherlands to ask if she would take her husband's place as leader of the Civil Rights Movement.

After many days of thinking it over, Baker declined, saying her children were "too young to lose their mother. Baker's first marriage was to American Pullman porter Willie Wells when she was only 13 years old. The union was reportedly very unhappy, and the couple divorced soon after marrying. Another short-lived marriage followed in , to William Howard Baker.

Since her career was already taking off under that last name, she retained it after the divorce. Jean-Claude Baker wrote that Josephine was bisexual and had several relationships with women. In , she began an extramarital relationship with the Belgian novelist Georges Simenon. She married French composer and conductor Jo Bouillon in , and their union lasted 14 years before also ending in divorce.

Later, she was involved with the artist Robert Brady for a time, but they never married. During her participation in the civil rights movement , Baker began to adopt children, forming a family which she often referred to as "The Rainbow Tribe". Baker wanted to prove that "children of different ethnicities and religions could still be brothers.

She charged an admission fee to visitors who entered and partook in the activities, which included watching the children play. She created dramatic backstories for them, picking them with clear intent in mind: at one point, she wanted and planned to adopt a Jewish baby, but she settled for a French one. She also raised them in different religions in order to further her model for the world, taking two children from Algeria and raising one child as a Muslim and raising the other child as a Catholic.

Bouillon claimed that Baker bore one child, though it was stillborn in , an incident that precipitated an emergency hysterectomy. In her later years Baker converted to Catholicism. Demand for seating was such that fold-out chairs had to be added to accommodate spectators. Four days later, Baker was found lying peacefully in her bed surrounded by newspapers with glowing reviews of her performance.

She was in a coma after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage. Baker was a Freemason. She has also been inducted into the St. In , she was inducted into the Legacy Walk in Chicago, Illinois. It celebrates Baker's life and works. It is open to the public and displays her stage outfits including her banana skirt of which there are apparently several. It also displays many family photographs and documents as well as her Legion of Honour medal.

Most rooms are open for the public to walk through including bedrooms with the cots where her children slept, a huge kitchen, and a dining room where she often entertained large groups. The bathrooms were designed in art deco style but most rooms retained the French chateau style.