Josephine Baker was born in St.Louis, Missouri. Chorus girl who rose to fame in the Folies Bergères in Paris, was a bisexual singer and actress who lived most of her life in France. She was known to have had many same-sex affairs.

Baker left home at age 13 to pursue a career in show business. Finding the United States difficult for black performers, she eventually settled in France.

Famous for her Parisian show La Revue Nègre and for walking her pet cheetah through the Paris streets; during World War II she served as an intelligence liaison and an ambulance driver for the French Resistance and was awarded the Medal of the Resistance and the Legion of Honor.

Between 1954 and 1965 she and her husband adopted twelve children of various races and nationalities, a family she called her "Rainbow Tribe". She died in France.