

Josephine Baker’s story of fame and espionage is an amazing and epic one of worldly espionage and fame. It is culturally criminal that it has not, as yet, been made into a film.

Mystery shrouds Josephine Baker’s early days. Her mother had been adopted by former slaves, and worked as a maid for a German family. The uncertain circumstances surrounding Josephine’s birth meant that the identity of her biological father would always be questioned by herself as well as others.

Her mother and the man she was told was her father performed a song and dance act together; this would be her introduction into the entertainment industry. She had a complex family situation which was worsened by the conditions of poverty, so by eight years old Josephine Baker began working as a live-in maid for white families were she was, on occasion, used and abused. One women burned her hands as punishment for adding too much soap to the laundry.

She left home at a young age seeking bigger opportunities, but opportunities were lacking, leaving her making subsistence by dancing on street corners for money and searching trash cans for food.

Opportunity, however, was not absent, just delayed. Her big break came when she found a job as a chorus line dancer; Josephine quickly rose to the top, which earned her a spot in a European tour in 1925. At the end of the tour, she moved to Paris, a city she fell in love with while touring, in Paris she starred in her own show at the ‘Folies Bergere’. After a decade she was world famous and was given the nickname the ‘Black Pearl’.

She stood up against racial discrimination by becoming involved in the Civil Rights Movement, she protested by refusing to perform to segregated audiences in the U.S. and by writing articles on the topic.

When the war broke out Josephine refused to leave Europe and rather joined the French resistance than run. Due to her involvement in the underground resistance, the Deuxieme Bureau (French military intelligence) recruited Josephine with the title ‘honorable correspondent’.