April 12 - BlackFacts Black History Minute

BlackFacts.com: Learn/Teach/Create Black History

BlackFacts.com presents the black fact of the day for April 12.

Josephine Baker passed away.

She was an American-born French entertainer, French Resistance agent, and civil rights activist.

Her career was centered primarily in Europe, mostly in her adopted France.

She was the first Black woman to star in a major motion picture, the 1927 silent film "Siren of the Tropics".

Although based in France, Baker supported the Civil Rights Movement during the 1950s.

She refused to perform for segregated audiences in the United States, although she was offered $10,000 by a Miami club.

In 1951, she made charges of racism against a club in Manhattan, where she had been refused service.

Actress Grace Kelly, who was there at the time, rushed over to Baker, took her by the arm, and stormed out, vowing never to return. They became close friends after the incident.

After decades of rejection by her countrymen and a lifetime spent dealing with racism, in 1973, Baker performed at Carnegie Hall in New York and was greeted with a standing ovation.

Place Joséphine Baker in the Montparnasse Quarter of Paris was named in her honor.

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