Josephine Baker: Racial Refugee Comes Home

One hundred long time ago a star was born, merely its light, standardised that of real stars, took many years to stress us. Josephine baker, dancer, actress and singer, sh whizz on the st dayss of France long sooner she was legitimate here in her native country. Having break loose from the poverty of her early childhood, baker became a captionary performer in France precisely to be dismissed by the Statesn audiences of the 30s. Her fiction, fortunately, does not end there, as the changing favorable climate led to bakers eventual return and her efforts in the civil rights movement.Though it took decades, the Black Venus finally claimed her place in the history of American entertainers. bread makers early family disembodied spirit was a world away from the bearing of glamour she was to later lead in France. Born Freda Josephine McDonald in St. Louis, Missouri in 1906, baker was subjected to the racial prejudices of the times as a result of her mixed ingrained Ameri can and African-American origin. Sources vary on the identity of bakers father, entirely the official version lists Eddie Carson, a vaudeville theater theater theater drummer, and Carrie McDonald, a washerwoman, as bread makers parents.As an infant, Josephine was taken by her yield to winerooms and vaudeville houses where her father performed (Haney 1981, p. 6). St. Louis had an important music motion-picture show at the time, and this certainly had quite an uphold on the young Freda. Carson soon throw out overprotect and child, and bakers mother married another man, Arthur Martin, with whom she bore a son and two more(prenominal) daughters. Martin, frequently unemployed, could not support the household, and so bread makers childhood was spent cleaning, tike sitting and waitressing.bread maker describes work ating for the Mistress, a wealthy pureness woman, in her autobiography, where she was required to get up at five in the morning (Baker and Bouillon 1977, p. 3) There was coal to fetch, the stove to stoke, chamber pots and spittoons to empty, bed to make wood to cut, the kitchen clean. She did get out to go to school, but then worked laterwards school as intimately, sleeping in the Mistresss cellar at night. Baker was unless seven years old. Haney (1981, p.10) suggests that Josephines mother harbored resentment against her daughter, blaming her for the expiry of Carson perhaps this, along with the familys poverty, explains wherefore Carrie McDonald sent her daughter to the Mistress. Josephine finally returned headquarters after the Mistress was arrested for physi nominatey abusing her, but Josephine wound up living ofttimes of the time with her grandmother and aunt as her relationship with her mother deteriorated even further. Bakers feelings for the country of her birth were ever abidingly to be influenced by the experiences of her youth in Missouri.In her autobiography, she recounts the story of seeing her neighborhood go up in flames and seeing a black man beaten when whites distinct to avenge the alleged rape of a white woman in July of 1917. Upon leaving her house to find the conflagration, Baker tell she thought she was looking at the revelation (1977, p. 2). Jean-Claude Baker and dog (1993, p. 30) reject Bakers claim to have witnessed the St. Louis melt down riots, arguing that she only learned the story later from others. In any case, much(prenominal) an event was to leave a leading impression on Josephine.Not surprisingly, she was to leave St. Louis at a young age in search of a more burnished forthcoming. In Josephines youth, a brighter future was not available to her through raising she could only escape through marriage. At the age of only 13, Josephine married Willie Wells, a man more than twice her age (Baker and Chase 1993, p. 36). The marriage was illegal and transitory (to be followed by five more marriages over the years), and Josephine was destined to return to her mothers house. Her true escape came when she get together the St. Louis Chorus line, where she was an instant hit.Baker was soon touring with vaudeville troops, performing skits. Though audiences love Josephine, she go about racism in town after town, where she faced the Ku Klux Klan and segregation (Haney 1981, p. 29). Baker proceed her rise to stardom, though, when in 1921 she landed a role in the Broadway production of walk Along, despite original concerns that she was too darkness for the part. As the show became a hit, Josephine do an enormous salary for the time. When the production came to St. Louis, Josephine performed before a mixed audience, but the blacks were curb to the balcony seating.Josephines biological father, Eddie Carson, reportedly showed up to ask to be hired for the show, only to be rejected (Haney (1981, p. 39). Baker followed up her success with a role in The Chocolate Dandies in 1924 and became a legend in connection with the Harlem Renaissance in 1925 at Th e Plantation Club. The real tour point came later in 1925, though, when Baker make her debut in capital of France with Joe Alex and the Danse Sauvage in La Revue Negre at the Theatre des Champs-Elysees. The audience loved Baker, who danced wearing only a join skirt.From there, she went on to tour Europe and ultimately star in La Follie du Jour at the Follies-Begere, often beting with her pet leopard and bound in a skirt made of bananas. She was to star in two movies, ZouZou and Princess gong in the mid-thirties, by which time she was one of the highest paid entertainers in Europe (Official target). In 1936, though, Baker was to be forcefully reminded of the barriers African-Americans were lining in her native country when she returned to the get together States to star in the Ziegfield Follies.Unpopular with American audiences and critics, Baker was eventually replaced by Gypsy flush Lee. In fact, Josephine met the realities of American racism as soon as she got off the boat from France, as she was refuse a room in several new-sprung(prenominal) York hotels because of her color. Miki Sawada, Bakers maid at the time, was with her and described what happened (Baker and Chase 1993, p. 191) I could not believe this could be the same woman I had seen in Europe, standing triumphant on the stage, showered with flowers.Here she was huddle together before me on the floor, weeping. In furtherance photos for the production, Baker was lit so that she would appear lighter. She wrote to a friend, be assured, if I indirect request to make a telephone call in the street, Im mollify a negresse (Baker and Chase 1993, p. 196). After the composition critics panned her performances, the show closed and Baker returned to France. despite her experience in the thirties, Baker returned to America in the fifties and sixties to work to advance civil rights for people of color.The some famous instance occurred when Baker worked with the NAACP to protest segregation at The Stork Club. Animosity brewed as a result between Baker and gossip columnist Walter Winchell, which led to Bakers name being deflower in the Red Scare of the McCarthy era. Baker found other ways to combat racism as well, adopting twelve multi-ethnic children who came to be known as the Rainbow Tribe. The set-back of her children, a son, was an occupation baby, a baby of mixed Japanese and Western flight from Tokyo.Other adoptees hailed from Finland, Columbia, Canada and Israel (Baker and Bouillon 1977, p. 192-196). By the time of her death in 1975, Josephine Baker had accomplished more in her lifetime than anyone could possibly have imagined was practicable for an African-American woman born at the beginning of the century. Not only did Baker manage to overcome the poverty and social limitations of her youth, she emerged as legendary entertainer, a combatant of civil rights and a mother to so many who came from homes and situations as bleak as her own had been.Despite the many occasions on which her fellow Americans rejected her, Baker neer gave up on her homeland and used her experiences as motivation to work toward a better society. The spate of biographies and the documentary of her life that have sprung up in the last two decades are a pledge of the changing social climate and racial relations in America, as well as a sign of the higher status of Bakers legacy. Bibliography Baker, J.and Bouillon, J. (1977) Jospehine. newly York, harpist & Row Publishers. Baker, J. C. and Chase, C. (1993) Josephine The Hungry Heart New York. Random House. Biography. Available from The Official Site of Josephine Baker, Josephine Baker Estate c/o CMG Worldwide Accessed 19 October 2006. Haney, L. (1981) Naked at the Feast A Biography of Josephine Baker. New York, Dodd, Mead & Company.