Timesuck with Dan Cummins - 159 - Josephine Baker: Spy, Sex Symbol, Superstar

Episode Date: September 30, 2019

Josephine Baker. What a meatsack!! Such an incredible person. The modern world's first internationally famous black, female celebrity. She lived a lot of life. She was born into extreme poverty in St Louis. She overcame incredible odds to become a touring performing as a young teenager, working her way into the Philadelphia theater scene, then making it big on Broadway. Then she made it France and became a HUGE star. She broke racial barriers, became a spy and war hero for France, became famous for adopting children of various races in attempt to show the world we all can get along. And she did so, so much more! Hear about it all today on Timesuck. Hail Nimrod! My new horror podcast Scared to Death is ALIVE! Listen on Spotify, Stitcher, iTunes, Youtube, and more! Donating $3000 this month to the nonprofit - Youth on Record. Helping at-risk youth graduate and build careers in the arts. To learn more or donate yourself, go to https://www.youthonrecord.org/ Happy Murder Tour Standup dates: (full calendar at http://dancummins.tv) October 10-13 Tampa, FL Sidesplitter's Comedy Club CLICK HERE for tix! October 19 Minneapolis, MN 10,000 Laughs Comedy Festival CLICK HERE for tix! October 24-26 Portland OR Helium Comedy Club CLICK HERE for tix! November 1-2 Columbus, OH Funny Bone Comedy Club CLICK HERE for tix! Listen to the best of my standup on Spotify! (for free!) https://spoti.fi/2Dyy41d Timesuck is brought to you by Hims! Try hims today with FREE online visit. ForHims.com/timesuckED Watch the Suck on Youtube: https://youtu.be/UNo-tGRLL5w Merch - https://badmagicmerch.com/ Want to try out Discord!?! https://discord.gg/tqzH89v Want to join the Cult of the Curious private Facebook Group? Go directly to Facebook and search for "Cult of the Curious" in order to locate whatever current page hasn't been put in FB Jail :) For all merch related questions: https://badmagicmerch.com/pages/contact Please rate and subscribe on iTunes and elsewhere and follow the suck on social media!! @timesuckpodcast on IG and http://www.facebook.com/timesuckpodcast Wanna become a Space Lizard? We're over 5000 strong! Click here: https://www.patreon.com/timesuckpodcast Sign up through Patreon and for $5 a month you get to listen to the Secret Suck, which will drop Thursdays at Noon, PST. You'll also get 20% off of all regular Timesuck merch PLUS access to exclusive Space Lizard merch. You get to vote on two Monday topics each month via the app. And you get the download link for my new comedy album, Feel the Heat. Check the Patreon posts to find out how to download the new album and take advantage of other benefits.

I love an underdog story. Love a tale of someone succeeding despite the deck being stacked heavily against them. Based on general public perceptions about her race and gender during the time she was alive, based on the family she was born into, where she was born, there's no way Josephine Baker should have rose to fame and fortune. But she did. She didn't care about the rules or the odds. She just went for it. She lived life on her own terms, but as much as one can. She faced struggles with a smile and victories with the same smile.

She lived more life in one year than so many people seem to live in their entire lives. She fought and loved and lost and won, lost again, won again. The one thing she never did was give up. She was beautiful, she was funny, she was dramatic. She could be real asshole. She could also be the sweetest person in the whole world. She had a temper, a big heart, a bigger brain, a dancer's body, a gypsy soul, and a show it would have loved to meet her. She was a modern world's first black female superstar. Ernest Hemingway described her as the most sensational woman anybody ever saw. And by the end of this suck, you may agree with him without ever seeing her yourself

Her life makes one hell of a tale. So let's tell it today on time suck This is Michael McDonald and you're listening to time suck Happy Monday, meet Sack, some Dan Cummins, a master's sucker, and you are listening to Time Suck. Welcome to the Cult of Curious. Get ready for a bit of inspiration this week. Need a little break from the darkness? Boy, did I get a break with this tail? No less interesting.

Just knowing, you know, getting brutally murdered. So hail, Nimrod, Lucifina, and you, meet Sack. Thanks to all the amazing fans who came out to the Indianapolis shows, sharing your stories. Got a lot of stories this past week about how this show for, you know, for whatever reason over the last three years has helped people deal with depression, suicidal ideations, grief, anxiety, getting over a breakup,

getting over a divorce, dealing with surgeries, cancer, other medical treatments, PTSD, and more, or just, you know, just a boring tedious job. And I just want you to know that hearing all that matters. It matters to me a lot and motivates me to keep this shit coming week after week to really try and put my best into it because I know it matters to a lot of you. And that's, I feel very fortunate that it does. So it's able to do something that's not only entertaining,

but makes a difference in other ways in people's lives. Not all just peanut butter and limp shame cocks here. Community is full of a little bit of magic. So thank you, magical meat sack, mother fuckers for sharing that magic back with me. I feel the love, try to give it back, even during the real dark, horrific sucks. Love doing this.

Thanks for continuing to spread this sock, man, for the feedback, running into more and more of you in public and blown away. How many of you can tell me you love the new scared of death horror podcast? Feel so good about that. I had a golden mind of how many, you know, listens I wanted, you know, or downloads or whatever plays that I wanted to have in the first 60 days. And Lindsey and I beat that in the first 10 days. Thanks. You guys, I know now that the show will grow and evolve just like time suck has and I can tell you guys are spreading, spreading that one as well because we get comments from people

who don't even listen to time suck, the horror things, more of their jam, we have some people who like that more than time suck, which makes me very happy that to provide something different for different people. And thanks to Pat McAfee and the Maccabee, excuse me, Pat McAfee and the guys at Heartland Radio, 2.0,cabee and the guy is a Heartland Radio, 2.0. That podcast for having me back on, man, Pat, what a, the first time I actually met him was this one.

My episode of Heartland Radio is out right now, actually, and last time I was on the show, well, last time I was on the show, I should say, I met him, but like super briefly, just like in passing, hey, thanks for coming in the building, he was so busy all the time. And I respect the grind. And this time he actually popped in, sat on the show. Very funny guy. It was just cool to see him work.

Really smart guys. Smart, funny, Todd McCommas, you know, all those guys. Fucking awesome, just good, solid Midwest dudes. So thank you again. And give it, yeah, give that show a listen. If you just, if you just want pure fun, I laughed so much. And it's Heartland Radio 2.0. Not touring this week, but I'll

be back in Tampa again, it's side splitters next weekend. Last floor to shows for the tour. Last shows before I tape a new stand-up special in Detroit. Can't wait. Troids been sold out for a little while, but there are still our tickets to a next night show in Minneapolis. One show we do in there this year on October 19, 10,000 Laf's Comedy Festival. Then it's on to Portland, a helium comedy club, an organ Oregon Columbus, Ohio at funny bone Denver, Colorado comedy works downtown grand Rapids Gonna be there back at Dr. Grins To come with it to come a comedy club spoke can and spoke hand comedy club to finish out 2019 and Putting the finishing details on the tour for 2020 now. You can go to Dancomans.tv for tour info.

And last mention for the September charity youth on record. Go to youth on record.org to find out more about this great Denver based charity that we gave 3000 to on behalf of the space, lizards, the patron subscribers. The charity does so much for at risk youth Colorado. Finally, a big new time suck app update is out. So that's awesome. So excited about that. A lot of cool features.

Like the ability to filter episodes in your catalog, time suck catalog based on what you've listened to, what you've downloaded, what you've favored, you can favorite things now, and you can search now through the episode catalog. You can do like, you know, word searches, and you know, find out if we've done an episode already that you might want to listen to and all kinds of extra cool stuff, extra character bios, avatars, lots of stuff.

It's in the Apple and Google Play app stores. It's free. So we get the free, very improved time suck app. Thank you, Bidilixer. And now let's find out a whole bunch about a true star, super star. One of the one of the earliest international superstars, a star who used their talents for good, so much good, a woman who brought so much joy to so many and just lived a life to provide a great tale for us to hear today. Let's just talk about Josephine Baker. Today's suck is is going to do it in pretty much a straight forward way here. Not a lot of setup necessary.

We'll get into the context you don't need it as we go through the timeline. It's a big timeline today. It's going to take up pretty much the entire suck. So let's get ready to march. We head into 1906 to kick off today's time suck timeline. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Shrap on those boots soldier. We're marching down a time suck timeline. Josephine Baker was born on June 3rd 1906 and originally her name was Frida Josephine McDonald. So probably related to Michael McDonald. I'm going to assume I'm going to assume triple M.

Josephine McDonald so probably related to Michael McDonald. I'm gonna assume I'm gonna assume triple M You know probably I mean how many how many McDonald's are there really there's Ronald McDonald and there's Michael McDonald So one of those people Shesby related I like to choice to go to with Josephine nothing against the You know it's F. R. E. D. A. S. Freda Nothing against the Fredas of the world. Josephine more feminine, more sophisticated, sounding name. And I think it is Freda, because there's no eye in it, you know, like Frida.

Anyway, Josephine's mother was Karen McDonald and her father, at least the man she was told or her father was her father was Eddie Carson. Numerous biographers, the speculated that her mother may have had an affair with a German man. She was working for a German family. There's a lot of German immigrant families in St. Louis at the time when she became pregnant with Josephine. And Josephine was a lot lighter skinned than her siblings and her supposed father Eddie.

And while they presented themselves as a married couple, Karen Eddie weren't legally married and their relationship may have been a little looser than a married type relationship when Josephine was conceived. But to be clear, this is all pure speculation. And no one would speculate more about Josephine's real father than Josephine was conceived. But to be clear, this is all pure speculation. And no one would speculate more about Josephine's real father than Josephine herself. She'd later throw all kinds of different parentage possibilities. St. and father was black in some stories,

Jewish and others, European and others, American Indian and still other stories. And when Josephine was born, Kerry and Eddie had a small song and dance act in St. Louis. Born into some showbiz. Eddie was a percussionist, a vaudeville guy, and a native of St. Louis and Carrie had recently come to town from South Carolina. That was a mile into the southeast. Carrie come to St. Louis just two years before when she was 19. She chose St. Louis like thousands and thousands

of others to find work at the famous World's Fair of 1904, also known as the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. Back when St. Louis was popping, when it was comparatively much bigger and more important U.S. city than it is today. And that's not a knock on St. Louis. It's just, you know, just the truth. 1904, St. Louis was the fourth biggest city in the U.S. behind New York City, Philadelphia and Chicago.

Not even the top 50 now, which surprised me. I thought it would be much higher. Feels like it feels like it's much bigger than I guess it is. It's down at number 68, one behind Pittsburgh and one ahead of Cincinnati as far as the most popular US cities. This world fair was enormous. Big event, by the way, in our modern, you can find everything on the internet world that we have no really comparison. These type of fairs wouldn't happen the same way again today. World fairs were they're kind of big trade shows on steroids. Like a lot of steroids.

They didn't last a week and they last for months and months. We talked about another one in the the the H H home suck the Chicago's world fair. The St. Louis world fair last from April 30th all the way to December 1st, 1904 more than 60 countries and 43 of 45 American state to the time maintained exhibition spaces. It was attended by almost 20 million people, right around 19.7 million people. People coming from all over the world to St. Louis, coming to see the latest greatest technological innovations from around the globe.

The St. Louis fair was initially conceived as a centennial celebration to be held in 1903, the hundredth anniversary of the actual Louisiana purchase. But then the opening was delayed until April 30th, 1904 to allow for full-scale participation by more states, foreign countries. Who didn't have their shit together in time? Paul. Yeah, of course it was, Paul. The entire fair was delayed because the Polish people didn't have their exhibition space.

I'll set up, which was super frustrating because, you know, I mean, they were putting on what was arguably the least exciting exhibition. Well, other countries were showing off futuristic kind of products. Poland had what was supposed to be an exhibition called the Warsaw Wonder. It was the first 100% Polish person who could count to 100 without anyone helping. But in the last seconds, after passing two previous inspections, a fair official determined that the Warsaw Wonder was actually a chimpanzee that had been shaved down and trained to pretend to be Polish. If that sounds crazy, you know, fuck, do Google image search for Polish people and then

keep that window open and then open up another window and do a search for clean shave and chimpanzees. It's fucking uncanny how similar the pictures are. And of course, that's not true about Polish people. I just like to occasionally disparage my wife's heritage because I am quoted a sick puppy How similar the pictures are. And of course that's not true about Polish people. I just like to occasionally disparage my wife's heritage because I am quote a sick puppy. And I also like to imagine new listeners hearing episodes

and be like, what the fuck? How did you not allow to say that about, that's ridiculous. Let's talk about real exhibitions here. Numerous breakthrough in inventions were debuted at the Fair, like the X-ray machine, the baby incubator, the electric typewriter, the tele-autograph, which was an early like the X-ray machine, the baby incubator, the electric typewriter, the tele-autograph, which was an early version of the fax machine, the telephone answering machine

was debuted, automatic gatekeeper at each fair entrance was the first gatekeeper to admit one person after receiving the proper coin, and then automatically lock again until the next coin was inserted, that debuted. Electricity was the star of the show at this world fair. All the major buildings on the fairgrounds were lit inside and out by electric lights. The fair's thoroughfares were also illuminated by electric lights big deal in 1904.

Within the palaces of machinery, transportation and electricity, many electric powered machines that appliance run display. An inventor Thomas Edison himself was brought into oversee the assembly of the electrical exhibits. I'm sure rival and former suck subject, Nicholas Tesla was super annoyed. Tesla was a big part of the 1893 Chicago World Fair. That was the first all electric world fair. The electrical plug and outlet like the wall outlet made their debut at this

fair. Can you imagine life without power outlets now? It makes me anxious to even think about that. Like outlets are literally the first thing I look for when I walk into a hotel room. When a room doesn't have outlets like in the desk and on the base of the nightstand and you know, USB charging docks, you know, built into the nightstand clock, I'm immediately annoyed.

What is this? What is this, a room or a flip and time machine? Am I staying in a room called at 1996 or the year, 1986? Oh my heck, am I right? No one? Oh gosh dang, okay. No, but on and on. Ice cream cone, iced tea, the hot dog. Were they viewed as this world fair?

The squeegee bowling shoes, the electric scooter, purple grapes, hammocks, tricycles, pubic hair combs, cheese and crackers, fly swatters, deli slice turkey meat, toilet plungers, velcro shoes, extra sharp cheddar, super plus absorberty tampons, water beds, ant farms, peanut butter, butt plugs, showbiz. All made their debuts in my mind. I lied about everything from squeegee on.

Many of the real items I listed before my nonsense are believed to have existed, you know, maybe a few months, year or two before the fair, but they were debuted and they had their big debut at the St. Louis fair in the summer of 1904. So Josephine Baker is born in the aftermath of a tremendous display of experimentation and innovation. Born in the aftermath of curiosity and wonder for at least one year, St. Louis was arguably the most exciting and lively and intellectually invigorated city in America's exciting time. And Josephine was also born in two poverty, extreme poverty. Oh, man, she had a hell of a childhood.

Downtown St. Louis, where Kerry and Eddie lived and worked in the wake of the World Fair, was full of grimy, rundown housing. Much of it just, you know, quickly built to provide, you know, very cheap housing for all the labor required to service this world's fair. Outside of the world's fair, St. Louis was also a big slaughterhouse down at the time. Thousands and thousands of cows brought into city to fulfill their hamburger patty and leather boot destinies. Smell the death was quite literally in the air.

Day and night, the stench of the slaughterhouses, tanneries and meatpacking factories walked over the narrow, cobbled, gaslit streets of the city. Neighborhoods were also coated in shut, constantly being dispersed from railroad activity st. Louis was a huge railroad town if you're old time evil guy with a handlebar must actually enjoyed time dame those to some train tracks st. Louis was a town and this is important when st. Josephine was born

and Josephine's born sorry she wasn't st. Josephine uh... summit may feel that she's saying just uh... the st. Louis area was one of the most important interesting areas in America in regards to black American culture. St. Louis has a super interesting history, especially when it comes to African Americans. Let's dig into that tiny bit before we bounce back into Josephine's life.

The city was founded in 1764 as a trading post on a long bend to the Mississippi River. And like much of the Southeast or in the US at the time it belonged to France. And as the town grew, French culture would influence its character. It was named after King Louis IX of France. Actually, technically when it was founded,

St. Louis belonged to the Spanish, but because word traveled so slow back in the 18th century, local French explorers didn't yet know that. They didn't know that their king had given away their territory when they're like, these are the French. You know, it's like, nah, it's fucking spaying technically, but you know, you'll figure that out in a year or two. I find the French founding and interesting

considering how France would later become such an important part of Josephine's life. It would become her true home, her spiritual home, and yeah, just you know, where she would actually live for most of her life and the place that would make her a superstar. In the early 19th century, one of the many things a French gentleman was judged by

was the refinement of his servants. So as a matter of pride for many French slave owners to see that their slaves were very well educated, which is very different than slave owners in most of the English territories who strongly discouraged any type of self-improvement from their slaves, actively tried to keep them uneducated.

Right, they had to hide learning because they wanted them easier to be able to control, I guess. Most English slaves were illiterate, often received no formal education whatsoever. Many French slaves could read and write, and if a slave had ability at some type of like craftsmen or as an artist, a painter, or a sculptor, their skills would actually be encouraged. Their talents would be nurtured, which is so fucking weird to me considering that they were still enslaved. I had like, what a weird situation to put somebody in.

Oh, you Maurice, this boat is beautiful. I think we love weird situation to put somebody in this. Oh, you know, Reese, this boat is beautiful. I think we love it when you work with the oils. You have paid great attention in your lessons. I was thinking, each time you'll trust someone press one is on, I want you to work with some watercolors. Mercy must appear. I would rather stay focused on the oil. You will work with the watercolors, but you will get to whip. It's fucking crazy. Like, how where does that? To educate someone, encourage their natural talents, but not free them. And in a way, it seems almost more cruel to me.

Because I would imagine that the smarter you get, the more aware you would be of the evil nature of your own slavery. Some slaves, achieved an even broader education by attending their masters on trips to Europe. They'll be educated in Europe. Because of all this education, St. Louis became an early leading pre-civil war center of emerging black intellectual and artistic culture by 1803. When France sold its land in America to the United States, all 828,000 square miles of it, it was, uh, you know, the Louisiana purchase. There were some 5,000 African Americans in the St. Louis area comprising both slaves and some free men and women whose owners had emancipated them. So I guess,

you know, that's nice. That would happen sometimes. This was more than the white population of only a few thousand trading posts grew into a town in the city immigrants from other European countries as well as France began to flood into it. Many came from Germany, others from Spain, Greece, Italy, Syria, Ukraine. One reason why they chose St. Louis was because the ground around it was fertile and it was located in a great place for 19th century transportation methods. Growing number of railroads were cutting through St. Louis. The mighty Mississippi connected to other cities as far as part of, is a Pennsylvania in

the North, New Orleans in the South. Many of these newly arrived European immigrants had no prejudice against blacks or at least less prejudice, and many even held anti-slavery opinions prior to the Civil War. So America, prior to the Civil War, not a good place in general for black Americans, but St. Louis was one of the better places for black Americans. They also had a strong musical tradition as far as in the city in a in a many local african americans began to study music in a in a formal european tradition the standard of black musicians in st. Louis became as high anywhere else in

america and then the civil war ended in april of eighteen sixty five and southern slaves were free to flood of them immigrated north and one of the most common immigration destinations with st. Louis there was this magical and you know with his opportunities for everyone black americans already lived in St. Louis before the Civil War. We're comparatively doing pretty well compared to other urban, you know, black populations around the states. Thanks to all that French education, you know, they were educated craftsmen. They were the best

artists, musicians, barbers, caterers, etc. Many of them settled on the South, the city's South side, living in substantial houses, even though segregation was the rule in many areas of life in St. Louis, their children, at least in the initial wake of the Civil War, attended both public and parochial schools with the children of white people. The freed slaves migrating north found less skilled work in St. Louis, you know, area than they were hoping for. They worked as field hand servants, dockers, you know, porters, other types of factory work.

Many of the men were building the rapidly growing railroads. By 1900 St. Louis had become the biggest railroad junction in all of America. When it's famous union station was completed in 1894, 42 different railroads met there. And I jumped ahead of myself a little bit. When they initially got there, they did find work, which is why, you know, so many people kept coming. A resembling a turtid medieval castle is stone. This union station covered three acres

in the heart of downtown St. Louis. Served to more passengers than any other railroad station in the entire country. No longer a train station in case you're curious. Seized operation in 1978 as an active train terminal. Not so fancy hotel. And aquariums supposed to open the next few months. So you know, check that out if you like

back in the aquariums there. Anyway, the huge influx of blacks in the St. Louis after the Civil War from the South Sementa by 1904, the time of the world's fair, it was, it was not quite the mecca of upper, you know, crust of African American life that it once had been because too many people had moved in, way too many. Many of them former slaves who weren't educated, weren't skilled craftsmen, and there just weren't enough jobs to go around. By 1924, it was getting just hard for unskilled men to find work in St. Louis.

It'd been good for a few decades and now poverty is growing year after year. And so is racial tension. White unskilled laborers starting to really resent the influx that their black counterparts competing for the same jobs, especially since they were willing to work for less wages. Wages paid by white factory owners, I might add.

Since it's at the anger of those white factory workers was misplaced, right? Don't be mad at the dude. Willing to work for less than a fair wage. Be mad at the employer. Willing to pay them less than a fair wage. Now let's get back to Josephine's family. When Carrie McDonald arrives from South Carolina,

she's a company buyer and mother in her elder sister, Elvera. Elvera had lost her husband in the Spanish American War of 1898, now received a small pension from the US Army. She used that pension to run a small apartment and he pours part of St. Louis on Lucas Street. A little tiny apartment's crammed in houses, you know, a cram between smoke-belted infactories

that made shoes and saddles, carpets and coffins, drugs and buggies. And when a St. Louis is a most famous exports at the time, German beer. St. Louis is still a big beer town. Anheiser Bush still has a giant brewery complex in St. Louis, one that opened way back in 1852. A tractive 19 year old Kerry soon finds work as a waitress and in a free time she begins to explore the city's exciting nightlife.

St. Louis did have one of the best, if not the best, African-American nightlife scenes in the country at that time. Neighborhoods would come alive at night, with music and dancing. The popular music of the day was ragtime. And St. Louis with a strong musical tradition had some of the very best ragtime players in the entire world. Originally developed in formerly by random Midwestern pianists,

pianists, excuse me, and later formalized by, you know, a composer, pianist like Tom Turbin and Scott Joplin, eventually arranged for orchestras. Racktime became widely popular all over America, beginning in the 1890s. And the subject of ragtime does bring me to today's first sponsor. Today's time so it's brought to you by Rack Time gets the whip, a recently rediscovered album of Rack Time Classics reinterpreted by none other than musical master Albert Fish. Let's hear a sneak peek of how Albert added some really, really nice heartfelt lyrics

to Scott Joplin's 1902 classic, The Entertainer. When you like it a little naughty, when you crave some sexy party, when you need your sweet bottom spank, when you need your pee was really cranked, when you want your monkey smashed, when you need to get your nips last, that up when you come on over bring that hot apple side I'll bring your peanut butter showbiz boom boom. Haha yeah. How's that for music? How's that for showbiz? That of course not a sponsor. I was just excused towards you a bit with Mr. Fish Who for some reason is very fond of singing Inside the suck first only I don't believe he was known to ever sing in real life. Anyway, that makes me way too happy to be able to do so

like that, back to real history. St. Louis was alive with music and dancing, Josephine's mother Carrie was an exceptional dancer. Not only was Carrie good dancer, I'm an idiot. She also wanted to be a performer. St. Louis had a lively nightclub and theater scene, and she did a bit of acting local theaters at the Gady Theater.

She was cast as a native in a production called a trip to Africa, where she met fellow cast member Josephine's dad Eddie Carson and fell in love. Eddie was a fast-talking charismatic, sharply-dressed dude known locally as Spanache. A name which implied he had some Spanish blood, maybe he did. St. Louis existed under Spanish influence for decades at the end of the 18th century. Eddie made a living as a drummer, played in street parades, picnics, funerals, saloons, brothels, Vodville houses, the Vodville houses in St. Louis's notorious Chestnut Valley, which was a red light district near Union Station.

Chestnut Valley was filled with honky-tongues, gambling halls, barrel houses, serving nickel shots of liquor. Barrel houses were everywhere at the time. This type of business is thought to have originated in San Francisco during the gold rush of 1849, starting out as simple shacks with bars that were offered just a plank of wood across two barrels. That is pretty simple.

They soon developed a pretty standard layout, to be a saloon with dance and downstairs and then rooms for prostitutes upstairs. And the saloon hosted this with dance with customers in order to get them, you know, in the mood to visit the other girls upstairs. And Eddie liked to hang out in these bars and gambling halls and play pool and flirt with

the ladies and talk about music. And Kerry fell in love with this fun party, dude. Pretty soon they put to get a little song and dance act of their own with routines devised by Eddie and they took work wherever they could find it, holding the wall, little Valleville houses, bars, restaurant, you know, these barrel houses, you know, wherever. And about a year after they met, Long came Josephine. Carrie couldn't dance towards the end of her pregnancy, so Eddie took up work with a little trio for a while. And when Josephine was still a newborn, sometimes Carrie would bring her to watch Dad play. She was around entertainment, not since she was a baby, but since before she

was a baby, since she was in the womb, she was on the stage. Few months after Josephine's birth, Carrie and Eddie briefly resumed their song and dance act, but then Carrie gets pregnant again. On October of 1907, when Josephine is just 16 months old, Carrie and Eddie have a son, Richard, who they called Little Dick. A nickname that while cute when he was a toddler would haunt him tremendously in later years.

I have no idea if they called him Little Dick. Probably not, since I made that part up. What I do know is that shortly after Richard was born Eddie and Carrie split up. They were done. Eddie was apparently ready for, not ready, excuse me, for the trapping to fatherhood. And he bounced. Carrie was devastated. She loved him madly. And when he left, so did her chance in a career as an entertainer. Right now, she was a single mom without an act, a single mom with two mouths to feed fucking Eddie ruined everything. For the rest of her childhood, Josephine would feel that her mother took out her anger over her father's abandonment on her. She looked like her dad more than the other, you know, more than her sibling or their brother. You

know, the father that Carrie thought of, you know, as her ticket out of the slums into the glamorous world of entertainment had abandoned her. Carrie went back to live with her sister and mother after Eddie left, became grim, bitter, a resentful person, took whatever menial labor job, labor job, camera way to support her two young children, cleaning houses, doing laundry, whatever works she could get in overcrowded St. Louis. Later Josephine would recall that her mother and moments of anger and frustration would tell her that she hated her, wanted her dead. These were some of her earliest memories, memories of poverty, of missing her father,

of having an angry, resentful mother who seemed to hate her. So overall, super fun, early childhood. Kerry also didn't waste any time finding a new guy. Just months later, she met Arthur Martin, big tall, short tempered, but not unkind laborer. He was no Eddie. There was no nightlife with Arthur, no hope for riches, but at least he was there and he wasn't going anywhere. And her new life is Mrs. Martin. Carrie moved out from Lucas Street with her two children to set up a home with Arthur

and then they moved again and again and again. Arthur wouldn't have been Carrie, but he would never do much to provide for her either. Arthur was one of the many, many unskilled laborers living in St. Louis and the family moved from one dump to another. Sometimes being evicted for not paying rent, sometimes skipping out just before they got evicted. They were borderline homeless. Carrie also got pregnant right away.

And on July 18, 19, 10, she gave birth to Josephine's half sister, Willie Mae Martin, less than a year later, she had another girl, Margaret. And poor little Willie Mae, when she was just a baby, she got clawed in the eye by the family dog, leaving her blind in that eye for the rest of her life. And guessing this unnamed dog got a little bit of a whooping for clawing the baby's eye. Just a guess. Probably got more punishment than a quick yell of bad dog.

Stop clawing baby, stop clawing baby's eye out. We don't claw baby's eyes out, dog. Snow Arthur and Carrie at four kids, at least one dog, they live in poverty and squalor. They were so ridiculously poor that Josephine would later remember that when it would snow, her stepdad would walk to whatever factory he'd found part-time work at in sneakers, wrapped in newspapers. He couldn't afford a single pair of boots.

Holy shit. You know, if you're feeling bad about your financial situation, think about the last time you walked to a factory through the snow with sneakers wrapped in newspapers. And if you can't remember ever doing that, maybe things aren't as awful as it could be. Maybe your financial situation could get considerably worse. At some point early in Josephine's childhood, the family stopped moving around from place

to place, got a house on a grass-hit street behind Union Station, and they shared it with another family. There was no gas or electricity. They shared the home, again, with another family, but at least it was a home. They got two bedrooms to call their own, shared the rest of the space. And the winner when it got cold in St. Louis, can for sure get cold, cold to temperature on records, 22 degrees negative Fahrenheit. They would heat their room with a fire, or I guess their room's plural, with a fire in a

metal barrel. Can you imagine that? Like open up a window in your bedroom to let the smoke out because you're heating your fucking bedroom with a fire in a metal barrel and open flame in your bedroom makes no sense to me it's crazy me but that's that's what I said in the most reliable biography I can find

uh... for ad insulation and cover cracks in the rooms are are to paper the walls with newspaper the toilet was in the backyard covered by a shed. Highly doubt the shed was heated. How fun would that be to walk out and below freezing temperatures to sit down and take a shit and some kind of freezing poop shed?

I bet that poop shed smelled amazing. Family bathed in a laundry tub, and Josephine is the eldest child. She got the water last for some reason. I've heard already been used by her mother, her stepfather, her brother, and her half sisters. Ugh! I feel so lucky right now to have never been so poor I had to take a bath and someone else's

bath water. Think about that. Think about washing your face and then you feel something on your lip. Is it some belly button, Lynn? From one of your siblings? Or is it a pube from your mom or your stepdad? How fun is that? The house was cold and full of bugs, rats and smells, but it was a step up because at least, uh,

you know, at the Graschitz Street house, the children had a bed to themselves. And the other places they lived, the whole family had to sleep in one bed, all of them. The children would sleep with the foot of the bed, carrying Arthur at the head of the bed with their feet in the children's faces. Good God. And apparently according to Josephine, Arthur's feet smelled so bad she would sleep on the floor and use newspapers for a blanket rather than risk throwing up in the bed.

Fuck me. I live in a trailer, I taste the government cheese growing up but I never use newspapers for a blanket. I never had to sleep with my face and my step-dad's feet. La. My dog's Penny and Ginger, live in so much more comfort

than Josephine and her entire family lived in. I think when I get home, I'm gonna beat the shit out of those dogs. Just to make life seem more fair. Right, they have it too good, let's be honest. Talk about humble beginnings, man. I wonder how often she cried herself to sleep. I'm guessing maybe every night.

And check this out, there are things are even more miserable than I just described. Let's talk about rats. Again, even though the Grasch at House was a step up from previous accommodations, it was also full of rats. The homes wooden floor had a bunch of holes in it. And through these holes in the floor, rats were constantly crawling up into the family's bedrooms. Sometimes they'd take an empty chili or tomato can, and they'd nail it over one of the holes. But then the rats would bite and claw the way around the tin,

invade the bedroom, scamper across the floor head for the kitchen where they look around, you know, poke and claws its gathering paper, gathering some rags for their little rat nests. There were so many rats that Josephine's brother Richard would often sit up in his bed at night and try to pick off the rats with a fucking slingshot. Oh my heck! Gosh darn! Why is that so flippin' sad? I want to make my kids listen to this episode. Never let them complain about anything, ever again. Dad, I don't wanna go to Texas Road House.

I wanna go to Tomato Street. How about we, we don't go somewhere, uh, you know, where you have to sit in your fucking room. You should have raps with a slingshot, okay? How about you be happy that we're not doing that? You imagine just sittin' up in your bed at night? Picking off rats. Ugh, no exterminator to call.

You couldn't afford to, you know to call one if there was one. These people were next level poor. And then not long after moving in the Graschett house, the family's financial situation gets worse, fun. Arthur who'd gotten a job at a local foundry around the time they moved into the Graschett house got, he gets fired for Punch and his boss. Richard would later describe the situation, saying,

one time his boss underpaid him five cents. When he counted his money and saw the human short change, he ran back to the office and punched his boss. A lot of people didn't mention a discussion. It's like one nickel short and it's like, oh, fuck, I punched him in the mouth. The police took him to jail. After his release, he was out of a job for a long time.

Everybody said he was crazy for being a boss. The Richard said, you know, but five cents could buy you a lot to eat in those days. That's another sign that you're super poor. When you punch your boss in their fucking face for shorting you a nickel. After losing a job, ours goes crazy for a while. Between the rats and the steel barrel fires in the bedroom and the freezing poop shed and wearing the shoes wrapped in the newspaper to get to the factory. You know, I get help with somebody to snap. Surely after it gets fired, you get so mad at Kerry for over cooking some hot dogs that he grabs a bunch of them,

tries to cram him down a throat in front of the entire family. Not long after that, his rage turns into depression and despair. And he falls into a pit of self-pity that he could never, ever fully crawl back out of. He was a broken man. Arthur begins taking to sit in a chair in the living room and just kind of quietly staring off from the middle distance most days. Kerry is able to pick up enough work to keep the family from getting kicked out of the grassroots, then the family, you know, kind of keeps barely moving along.

Josephine tries to get out of her parents' house as much as she can, spending time at a grandma and her aunt's home. 1911 when Josephine's only six, she's already working to help out the family's finances on days when Arthur isn't stewing in a crock pot of sadness. Some days before dawn, Arthur would take her and sometimes they're siblings on a two-mile walk to the Salard market. The city's great fruit and vegetable market to scavenge for food. This market is still around.

I haven't been to it, but it looks awesome. It's been going to, since 1779 and it's still there, still an active like farmers market. The market in Josephine's time was in these huge open air sheds, covering half of city block, where everyday farmers with horse tron wagons could bring their crops for sale. The sheds were crammed with stalls, these would overflow with fresh vegetables, cabbages, potatoes, turnips, broccoli, squash and carrots. Josephine was scavenged for brews and damaged fruit, vegetables that the vendors couldn't

sell. You know, fruit and vegetables that give her out of pity. She and her brother Richard also learned to earn pennies by picking up lumps of coal from railway freight yards and selling them. It was common for the poorest families of the area to send their children to do this. The theory being that the police would not prosecute children for these minor offenses. When she got a little older, Josephine improved on this by stealing coal from the wagons themselves. Daring an agile, she'd climb up on top of one of these wagons, you know, and then throw down lumps of coal to Richard, Margaret and

Willie May, who'd wait below. Again, it's just fucking preposterously sad. It's a preposterously poor. Also in 1911, Josephine starts going to school, it's near by Lincoln school and rolling in the first grade. There's short walk from the Graschitz Streethouse to the squat brick building with overcrowded classrooms and a small playground that catered to poor and middle income black students. And Josephine was amongst the poorest of the poor. She wore the same clothes to school every day for an entire year, one outfit, a blue, little dress, trimmed and white. Every day she wore that for the whole year.

She went barefoot until somebody finally gave the family a pair of cast off high heels shoes, or even her size. Arthur cut off the heels, gave them the Josephine to wear. The uneven soles, you know, think about this, is a high heel shoe with the heel cut off, as she has a strap to her feet, so at least she's not bare feet. Will they make her toes stick up because of the angle? So this makes her kind of walk funny, and so all the kids make fun of her. She's a huge target of mockery.

And this is when Josephine learns to employ a defense mechanism that she would later use to make the public lover. She became really funny. She started mocking the kids who mocked her right back. And she became basically a goofball class clown, exaggerating her funny walk, you know, like she's doing it on purpose, you know, embracing her shortcomings. She learned to cross her eyes, make silly faces that would crack up her classmates. Because then, at least she felt like she was controlling the laughter. They were laughing because she wanted them to, not just becaue out of mockery. She didn't love school, didn't care for teachers, didn't care for most of their students,

but she did love for some of what she learned in her history lessons. She loved tales of the kings and queens of Europe. She started to dream big dreams as children do, about living like royalty someday herself. Dreams that unlike, I'm guessing, you know, any of her classmates would actually ever live, but you know, Josephine actually would live these dreams one day. She also made a friend, a girl about the same age by the name of Joyce McDuffie who lived in the neighborhood. And Joyce would later have some funny things to say about young Josephine, who she called Tumpy, which was a childhood nickname. She said, Tumpy was always needling people. She'd poke the kids and stick her tongue out at them.

And Tumpy was dirty. I used to try to get her to clean herself up, but it didn't do no good. She was too fidgety. She'd wash half her face and forget to wash the other half. I mean, she also had some fire, young Tumpy, some spirits, some mischief, hairless of Fena. Uh, 1912 when Joe Sphin was just seven, a small black Vodville house, the Booker T. Washington theater opening Chestnut Valley on the corner of 23rd Street and Market Street. The room's owner was Charlie Turpin, brother of the popular ragtime musician Tom Turpin

that we mentioned. Do you want to hear Albert Fish sing some more ragtime? I mean, we can. I mean, if you want, we can get this back going again. Ta-da! No, no, no, okay, okay. And now, for a little, that's fine. Every week, Charlie ran a different show

with a different theme at the theater, African cowboy Egyptian and so on, and he managed to attract some of the best black talent of the area at the time. Blue singers, Ma Rainy and Ida Cox, the young, Bessie Smith, the comedy team of Butterbeans and Susie all played there. You can the comedy team of Butterbeans and Susie all played there.

You can find old recordings of Butterbeans and Susie on YouTube. I find it fascinating how much live comedy has changed over the years. This is what the early 20th century equivalent of stand-up comedy would be. dog. Here come the hot dog man. There come out. What are the ladies? What I see? You've got a hot dog stand. You know something so I'm known now as the hot dog man. Yes, the hot dog. Well, I want a dog without bread as you see. Wow, what's the matter? Because I carry my bread with me. Mm-hmm. I bet you do. You procure. And that's the natural fact.

Mm-hmm. Yes, and if I like you don't, Oh. Well, I'll come back. I know. Does anyone get the feeling they're not talking about actual hot dogs? Or actual buns? Yeah.

Call me crazy. I'm pretty sure they're talking about peens and plus. The old hot dog bun, peanut plus, switch a roof. Yep, yep, some early natty comedy. Josephine's friend, Joyce's older brother, or Joyceine's friend, Joyce's older brother, Robert, who was only 12 himself started to, you know, go see these shows like the shows like Butterbeens and Suzy and go to this theater and watch all different kinds of acts and he got inspired to create his own little shows. Hill Nimrod, young

entrepreneur. By early 1913, Robert started putting on little neighborhood productions and his family's basement called McDuffee's pin and penny poppy shows. To get in a watch, he had either pay a penny, he had to give him a pin because he needed pins to hold together the costumes. His little shows featured a chorus line that consisted of two girls, his sister Joyce and Josephine, how adorable is this shit? And that's when Josephine, only seven years old, started to dream about being an entertainer. Not a serious dream yet. You know, she's only seven. What the dream had begun. If you knew that her mother had been a dancer briefly, their mother was happy then. Her absentee father was still a musician, entertainment was interblood.

St. Louis 1913 was a great place to dream about becoming a dancer, had a lively dance and music scene thanks in part randomly to Mississippi River Boats. In the years before the Civil War, these river boats provided the main transportation for goods and passengers into and out of St. Louis. But then the war put a stop to most of the Mississippi traffic for, you know, the five years that lasted.

And then after the war, the growing railroads took away most of the river transportation of freight trade. What goods were on the river by this time mostly were toad and strings of barges behind tugs and then along came a guy named Captain Joseph Streckfuss a man from a German St. Louis family. He adapted his riverboat traffic to a new era owning several boats and experiencing continually declining freight business sales I decided to turn his boats away from freight usage and convert them into showboats each of his boats had a resident band

Mostly comprised of black st. Louis musicians and around 1910 he decided that he wanted not only musicians on his boats who could read music You know all respectable st. Louis musicians could do that But also those who had a little more life and rhythm in their plane will pepier. In particular, he was looking towards New Orleans at the mouth of the river where he had heard there was a music being developed that had a new drive and vitality. Music that would later come to be known as jazz. And Captain Streckfuss appointed one of his band leaders, fate, marable to be his chief talent spotter.

And soon the boats of the Streck the Sline were bringing hot new world's jazz musicians up the river to St. Louis mixing with the Delta blues the city's two musical styles blending and developing together. A lot of musicians who would later become famous played in these bands like Claire and Eddys Johnny Dodds his brother the drummer baby Dodds basses pops foster jazz legend Louis Armstrong and of course blues cowbell and triangle legend Grover Tater Todd McDonald, a grandfather of Michael mother fucking McDonald. Sure sweet freedom. Shine out on me.

You're all amazing. You're all alone with me. It's been too long since you got McDonald's. You got tripled and Grover Tater-Tot McDonald wasn't real. We all know that right. Mike and McDonald is from St. Louis though. So there is a McDonald's St. Louis connection. So maybe, maybe some kind of relationship,

I don't know, I've been done this 23 and me. Mike and McDonald born in St. Louis 1952 less than 50 years after Josephine. Now back to 1913, St. Louis musicians learned to play with more fire and then a looser, more complex rhythm. And this was reflected in the dances of the day. And by 1913, American gun dance crazy. They got a fever, dance, fever. New York tea dances become the rage of high society ballroom dancing, hot new developing trend from 1912 to 1914

over a hundred new ballroom dances were invented. People are dancing away. Those World War One blues, many of the dance of the day originated in St. Louis in those little barrel houses and clubs. Dance anywhere she could find in the streets or the yards of the houses around her young Josephine master, Dan Step after Dan Step, learning every dance the camera way, building up a huge repertoire practice steps. Then in 1915 is the ripe old age eight

Josephine had to get a real job Had to take a break from dancing had to go to work mom arranged for her to be a live-in maid It's a nearby home of Mrs. Kaiser a widow who lived alone and Josephine went to go live at Mrs. Kaiser's house First Mrs. Kaiser seemed kind she brought out Josephine address and a pair of shoes But then now is about as far as her kindness went. Joe Svina was made to sleep in the cellar with Mrs. Kaiser's dog. Next to piles of wood and coal, every morning at five,

she was expected to get up and perform a secession of chores. She had to light the fire, appeal to potatoes, empty the chamber pot. So my God, scrub the steps, sweep the rooms. Once a week, she had to do all the washing. And she'd set off for Lincoln school as an eight year old flipping heck. Working full time.

As it made, sleeping in the fucking cellar with the dog. Now lately my standup shows have been highly critical about the whiningness, the softness, the fragilness of many members of modern society. This is why. Read and show like this is why I don't have the same amount of sympathy some people do for other people's first world problems.

Do we still have problems of course we do, but holy shit, overall life so much better than it used to be. Most people now who identify as poor, still have smart phones, still have access to Wi-Fi, still have electricity, a bathtub, or you don't have to wash your face and your fucking step-dad's fucking pubic hair water. Right, still have a bed, you don't have to share with your siblings, you know, and have some grownups think you're feeding your fucking face. You're not sleeping in the cellar of a stranger's house with a dog. Not only did eight year old Josephine have to sleep in the cellar with the dog in work full time at eight years old. Her boss was also an asshole. If Josephine made the slightest mistake, Mrs. Kaiser would slap her silly. She was late getting out. Mrs. Kaiser would pull her out of her bed by her ears,

give her another beaten. Only good that came out of her experience at Misses Kaiser was the beginning of a lifelong love affair with animals. Josephine shared her food with that little dog she shared a room with. She loved that dog. The dog was crippled,

I haven't been hit by a car that permanently damaged its hind leg and she named him three legs. Just like both jangles. Too bad she couldn't have ran across both jangles. Our three-legged one-eyed pit bull suck star would have marched up that seller stairs. Noctis, his guys are on her cold German ass. You would have pissed on her nastier old kidbeat

and mistreatin' face, maybe taking a ride to shit in her mouth. Show bitch! That's how they do it in St. Louis. Josephine would have loved both jangles. Another creature in Miss Kaiser's house was a white rooster who lived in a cage tucked under Josephine's work table,

and Josephine named the rooster Tiny Tim. And for months, she fed and fattened and befriended Tiny Tim, talking to him as she would work. And then one day, Mrs. Kaiser told her, kill him, he's ready to be eaten. So that's fun. Numb was shocking, saddened as Josephine did, but she was asked, because she knew she'd get beat

if she didn't. She held her little friend between her knees, stretched his neck downwards, cried as she cut at his neck with a pair of scissors until the blood rushed down her legs. Kept her grip on him until he stopped twitching, and she kissed him, plugged him, handed him to Mrs. Kaiser.

And I imagine fantasized about pushing her down the stairs. Uh, Josephine got more into her history lessons at school, while this was going on, talking to interviewers years later, about how she would lay in the cellar at night and fantasize about becoming as rich and pampered as any queen of Europe. So you can get out of this fucking shithole. Finally, you got to leave Mrs. Kaiser's house after Mrs. Kaiser took her one of her

beatings too far one day. On the stage, Josephine let a pot boil over on the stove. And Mrs. Kaiser didn't care for it. And she took a little Josephine's hand, shoved it into the boiling water to punish her. I'll teach her a lesson, the boiler skin off. Terranacell free Josephine ran to the home with the woman next door, Halleyn and Painter skin, was already peeling off her hand. The neighbor picked her up, she passed out from the pain.

She woke up in a hospital bed to find her mom there with the doctor and a nurse. Her mother carried took her home, and that was the end of working for Mrs. Kaiser, who as far as I know wasn't punished. That's how she was. That's how she was. That's how she got in any trouble.

Very different times. Gladly progressed considerably since then in many ways. We may be whining here, a little softer, but we do treat each other better overall. Soon after leaving Mrs. Kaiser's house, Josephine was stuck right back in another household, where she would be again be given room and board in exchange for housework. Her parents just didn't have the money to feed her of themselves. For themselves. Of the owners of this second home, a married couple named Mr. and Mrs. Martin, were luckily kind and took pity on her, fed her well, letters, you know, she put on some

weight, she lost weight at Mrs. Kaiser's, letters sleeping on her own bed. And then the center home, a few months later, when they just didn't feel right, she was just too young to work in their house that way. After returning home, determined not to be placed in the home of someone else again as another child made. Josephine came up with her own way to make some money for the family. She started gathering groups of children from her neighborhood and she'd lead them to a cross town where she would take their money and then kill them.

And then the estimated she killed five to 600 children that way. No, she they would work together. She would take them across town to where the rich white folks lived and they'd go door-to-door offering to do anything that needed doing. Washington floors, running errands, scrubbing stoops, you know, mining babies, wax and furniture, shoveling snow, anything. On good days, she reckon that she can make 50 cents at what she would contribute 45 cents to the Martin family budget.

On bad days, when no work presented itself, she would lead the other children in scavenging through the rich white folks garbage. And she continued doing stuff like that or on and off for a couple of years. Then in 1916, when she was 10, she had an experience that would change her life forever. Small gypsy caravan rolled into St. Louis. It was the first time Josephine had ever seen Romani

or Roma people in their traditional, brightly colored clothes. He did do a a suck on the Roma people on these days, fascinating, fascinating culture. These nomadic people came to sell basically snake oil, a bunch of tonics and elixirs they claimed would cure everything, but really wouldn't cure a damn thing. They were exotic and charismatic and also they were fucking con artists. Now, and before they put on a little fake medicine scam, they would put on a free little Vodville show just to attract a crowd of hopefully some suckers they could, you know, and before they put on a little fake medicine scam, they would put on a free little Vodville show just to attract a crowd of hopefully some suckers. They can, you know, swindle a little bit later with their medicine. The ring litter of the caravan set up a little outdoor stage and amongst other things decided

to put on a little dance competition. Again, the dance craze going around the country. Josephine jumps on stage and she dances her skinnacle a little ass off, dances her heart out. And the crowd had gathered, cheered more for her than they did for any other dancer. She stole the show, won the grand prize, which was the dollar, which was the most money she'd ever made in a day. It was the first dollar that, you know, Joe Steve would ever make as an entertainer.

She'd go on to make more dollars than just about any other entertainer in her lifetime. For the first time in her young life, she, you know, she earned money for something that wasn't as sense, she just basic labor. She made money doing something she actually loved as opposed to hated. She'd soon dedicated her young life to making more money that way for the rest of her life. 1917 was another big year in young Josephine's life, not for a happy reason. 1917 is the year of the infamous St. Louis race riots. Take a few minutes to talk about East St. Louis where the riots originated before we go further.

Man, East St. Louis, rough. Situated across the river from St. Louis on the Illinois Bank of the Mississippi, the two towns linked by several bridges. And to give you an idea of what it's like to live in a state East St. Louis. When you Google, East St. Louis, Google wants to automatically add the word crime or murder to your search. I've been to St. Louis a ton of times over the years and when asked in about you like where to go, what to do, I've been told over and over. Wherever I go, make sure it is not East St. Louis.

I've been told, don't go there during the daytime, even ever, don't drive through it. When I googled East St. Louis, almost half of the first page of search results were about, were articles about murder, not kidding. Which is insane because its current population is only around 26,000 people. There's a lot more people where I live in Correta Lane, Idaho, thankfully way less murder. The chances of being murdered in East St. Louis are roughly 19 times greater than the national

average. If you're not good at math, that's a lot more times. The national homicide rate is around five murders per a hundred thousand people in East St. Louis. It's 96 murders per a hundred thousand making it more murderous than Chicago or Detroit. Even worse, only 25% of the people committing these murders ever end up getting charged with murder and criminal court. The national average is 60%. So a lot of people getting killed in the East St. Louis and whoever killed them, you know, is killing them is usually getting away with it.

That's a sign of a very bad neighborhood. Lot of people being killed and a lot of other people not giving a shit about arresting whoever is doing it or not caring about helping the police find whoever is doing it, sign of a bad neighborhood. 95% of the people living in East St. Louis today are black, more than two thirds of the city's children live in poverty, more than two thirds. The median household annual income is less than $20,000 a year, right? Less than $20,000 per home. The poverty threshold

for a household income, you know, it just over 25,000. Oh my gosh. So more people in East St. Louis live over 20% below the national threshold for poverty. Yeah, more than two thirds of the people living there. Man, that's a lot of extreme poverty. The unemployment rate in East St. Louis, almost twice the national average, the school system ranked as one of the worst in the state, one of the worst in the nation. Essentially, it's a tiny little third world nation inside the first world nation. So sad, people living in American town or stuff like that.

By the end of 1917, East St. Louis was even worse of a place to live than it is now. Kicking off 1970 was a 1917. It was a choking industrial wasteland. Grimey, smoke polluted, you know, crisscrossed with railroad lines. Most of the industry was meat related stockyards, slaughterhouses, packing plants, tanneries, fill in the city along with aluminum, smelters, breweries, chemical factories, tons of fun places, you know, the trade of their labor is very, very well, you know, made sure that they were healthy and safe,

not just disposable cogs and a solar machine. It was a place where you'd feel old by 30, feel ancient by 40, broke you down, dehumanized you, one big-ass factory of hopelessness and despair. And back in 1917, a lot more people lived there than now, over 60,000 people, who was a problem because less than 30,000 lived there in 1900. And while the population had exploded, the amount of available jobs had not far too many people for the amount of jobs available.

You know, the white people living in the white neighborhoods of St. Louis were starting to lose out on more and more labor jobs, to their black neighbors, to getting more and more pissed. Racial tension is building. And then some racist white politicians running in local 1917 elections began to increase this tension by getting poor white residents of St. Louis to think that the reason that they're poor was because of these black workers in East St. Louis. They're stealing their jobs.

They're just an easy tactic to say, I'll get it. If I get elected, I'll make sure they don't take your jobs anymore. Fucking scapegoats. Historically politicians fucking love a scapegoat, don't they? Corporate greed, that's not the reason you're suffering. Nah, nah, lobbyists selling away your economic interest to allow factory owners to become disproportionately wealthy at your expense. That's not the problem.

Oh, it's, you know what the problem is, it's insert ethnic group or foreign faction here. It's those assholes. If we could just get rid of those assholes, everyone would be happily skipping around on streets of gold. And hate-mongering work is so often does because too many people either don't want to think in complex terms or aren't intellectually capable of doing so due to multi-generational poverty and educational disadvantages and people get fucking pissed.

They get riled up. Unfounded rumors began to circulate about black residents Army themselves preparing to invade st. Louis and start raiding white people's homes and raping their women It's all propaganda pure paranoia and a response to this nonsensical slander lies groups of white residents decide to attack first You know some of that get them before they get us talk start holding some meetings angry mobs are formed And then in the night july 1st white man drives a Ford over the one of the bridges into East St. Louis, shoots into some black homes in response, some African Americans arm gather in the area. They shoot into another oncoming Ford killing two men that they think are

more of salons. Nope. They ended up shooting two white police officers who were coming over to investigate the initial shooting. and now shit is on. The fuse had been lit. Now it's triggering the explosives. The next morning, white's pouring out of a meeting in the labor temple downtown began beating blacks with guns, rocks and pipes. True mob mentality's taken over. White residents set fire to black homes.

They shoot black residents as they flee from burning properties. Blacks are being lynched in other areas of the city, such as downtown St. Louis where Josephine and her family live. Things get worse the next day in July second more white mobs loot burn more homes entire neighborhoods are set on fire fire would consume a total of 312 homes and buildings. Family life for many would be destroyed forever. By the time it was all over in schools reopened black student enrollment was down 35%. Fleeing blacks were not only savagely beaten, but were in many cases shot lynched white children, young men, women stood by, cheering them on, joining in the violence.

One case of corpse was strung up on a telegraph poll by a group of who shouted, get hold and pull for East St. Louis. They hold up the rope. Thousands of black residents would try to stream across, you know, the bridges into St. Louis when the race war got into full swing and most would never make it. Police shut down, you know, their road to escape. So no one could escape, you know, just kept them pinned on the bridge. Some in desperation tried to swim, they jumped off the bridge, drowned in the river. It was a chaotic dramatic scene.

Mother is carrying infants as they fled the city, men using baby carriages trying to push the elderly and disabled. And there are a few pitiful possessions to safety, crying children carrying household pets. And it was all over like a war scene. It was all over after another day of lute and violence and fires on July 3rd, a congressional investigating committee reported that at least eight whites and 39 Negroes were killed. That's their quote.

The Black Rights Organization that NAACP estimates the number at near a hundred. Some estimates that roughly 250 African Americans were murdered over the course of those three days. It was the worst race, right, in American history, and East St. Louis would never be the same. And young Josephine Baker was an eyewitness to it all. The riot called a purge by some, which seems like a more apt description.

So stared into her memory that she recounted it again and again for the rest of her life 47 years later when interviewed for Esquire magazine, Josephine would say East St. Louis was a horrible place. Yes, worse than the deep South. I was a little girl and all I remember is people They ran across the bridge from East St. Louis to escape the red necks the whites killing and beating them I never forget my people screaming a friend of my father's face shot off, a pregnant woman cut open. I see them running to get to the bridge. I have been running never since. Yeah man, stuck with her as it would. The riot changed race relations in the St. Louis area for years and years to come. There was no real apology when it was all over. The world was, or the wound,

excuse me, was never given a chance to heal. Only two white men were convicted of murder for beating one woman and killing her husband and son. Seven other white men were arrested for serious crimes. 12 black men were arrested for serious crimes. The local black population in both East St. Louis and St. Louis now had something new to worry about. Racism of course had existed before.

As had, you know, constant insults, segregation, sporadic violence, including lynchings, but nothing like an all-out three-day violent purge. Josephine wanted nothing more than to get to fuck out of St. Louis, put his memory long behind her. It was bad enough that her mother had twice sent her away from home to work. Now it seemed the gangs of white races

could render you homeless by burning your home to the ground. Luckily for Josephine's entertainment dreams, the city was alive with music after the riots. New dance steps kept coming along for her to learn. And you know, with the nationwide songwriting boom now in full swing, we're always new songs, which she enjoyed singing. 1919 when Josephine was just 13, after missing her curfew and getting a bare-assed whipping with the belt from her mother, Josephine ran away from home, fully entered the adult world, which in many ways she'd

already lived in since she's around eight. And I have to take one quick drink of water and I'm going to keep talking. I have drank about four glasses of water this morning. I don't want I'm so thirsty. Before we move further, how creepier are bear bottom spangies at 13? I mean, come on, two old. Might have been somewhat normal for the time, but 13 seems way too old for bear bottom spankies at 13. I mean, come on, two old might have been somewhat normal for the time, but 13 seems way too old for bear bottom spanking. Most 13 year old girls are well into puberty by the age 13, which means they have puberty

care, which means I don't know, maybe you shouldn't, you know, not have them take their underwear off for any form of punishment whatsoever. I never stood the bear bottom part of spankies at any age. I feel like a spanky with clothes on is plenty punishment. You know, so maybe we should let theankie with clothes on is plenty punishment. Now, so maybe we should let the kids keep their clothes on. It comes to being punished. Can we do that?

Can we agree on that? No more naked kid punishment? I mean, it feels unreasonable. Anyways, at 13, the owner of a local ice cream shop, let Josephine state his house after she runs away. Doesn't appear as if he's some creepy perv either. Which is pretty sweet. We have plenty of creepy pervs in these stories.

Nice to meet dudes who are just good dudes. After a few weeks of refuge and a chance to gather her thoughts, Josephine goes to live with her grandma. She also got herself another job as a waitress at a musician's hangout on Pine Street, Chestnut Valley District. Place called the old Show Furs Club.

Life then began to get a little bit better for Josephine. She was now earning a regular wage, even if it was just a small one. she was meeting the kind of people she wanted to be one day. She wasn't, you know, living with angry mom. Josephine loved life at the old show first club, the best black entertainers in town, frequent in it. Sometimes play there. She waited on table. She would kid around with them, imitating the way that, you know, they'd sing and dance, amusing them by making the same funny faces and horse and around. Like, you know, like she had when kids made fun of her at school for wearing

the same dress over and over and having those fucked up high heels with the heels torn off shoes. Also next door to the club was the pithian hall, the clubhouse of the pithian society. It was in the society's marching band that her father Eddie played the snare drum. And while she was working at the club, he was drumming in the clubhouse band. All right, hearing that she was working at the old show, show first club, Eddie took to drop in and see her from time to time. Now in his mid 30s, he'd remarried, taking on three stepchildren and his career was going pretty well. Recently, he'd even played drums for a season with the Ringling brother circus. Seeing him as prosperous, Joseph, you would ask him for money time to time and she'd give him some.

Or, you know, he'd give her some sometimes but one day she asked for a watch He refused saying he couldn't afford it and Josephine felt abandoned by her dad all over again She felt slated by the fact that he had money to raise three new you know stepchildren But didn't have money to buy his own daughter a daughter he'd abandoned the gift of a watch One day the one day each week Josephine had off from the club Sunday Joe Sphere walked to the book of T. Washington theater, pay a nickel for admission and enter what to her was a magical and chanted world. A world of music and bright colors of laughter and magic.

She watched the line of high kicking chorus girls wanted to be one of them. And she also met Willie Wells when she was 13 and who is Willie Wells? Well, we're going to find out right now for a quick word from another sponsor. Time talk, time talk, excuse me, is brought to you today by the A whole air banjo academy. Use a promo code baker to get 50% off some St. Louis air banjo ragtime lessons. And just one or two minutes, you'll be jamming along to tunes just like this. I'm playing, playing, playing, playing, playing,. Time suckers brought to you by hymns. With age comes wisdom. We're getting older and also be a downer. 40% of men by the age of 40 struggle from not being able to get and maintain an erection. Thankfully, there's

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timesuck app. All right, back to Willie Wells. Josephine met Willie Wells. So when she was 13, Willie was 15 or 16. And shortly after meeting, they too decided to get married. Things were moving fast. And they did get married.

Both their families met at the church. The two were wed. Both families were apparently cool with it. I mean, I mentioned she was 13, right? Different times. The marriage wouldn't last long. Young Willie wasn't much of a moneymaker. He wasn't a better provider than her father or stepfather.

And young ghostfiend, truly just a kid, you know, yelled at him about not following through on whatever foolless promises. Any 16 year old boy would make in this situation. And then one night when they'd only been married just for a few months, Willie burst into the house. There was Tamu Josephine's parents, Carrie and Arthur at the time. He ran past Carrie and Arthur who were sitting in their living room, bolted up the stairs to his and Josephine's room yelling,

come on out here. Let me break your neck. Door slam shot behind him when Carrie and Arthur heard a loud smash and banging the ran upstairs into the room. Josephine was standing there holding a broken bottle. Willie was standing in shock, blood pouring down his face from a deep cut just above his eye. Josephine simply said, I was defending myself. Willie ran off to get to the doctor, to get his eyes stitched and he never came back. That was the end of the marriage, which had never been made legal through the courthouse anyway. Shortly before this fight, Josephine had bought a bassinet and there

are rumors that she was pregnant. Her brother Richard will go on to think that after really left, Josephine got a back alley abortion. And this room would lead others to speculate that this alleged abortion may have somehow damaged her reproductive organs enough to make it difficult later in life for her to carry a pregnancy to the full term. 19, 20, the age of 14, Josephine was recruited from the old chauffeurs club into the Jones family band who were essentially locally known street performers. She learned to play the trombone and would play in dance and sometimes even sing in the

band would often play in front of the local Booker T. Washington theater, entertaining those who waited to buy a ticket or those who were pouring out after watching the show. And one of these shows, she cut the eye of the theaters manager, Tommy two fingers teacup. Now teacup wasn't Tommy's real last name. They called him that because he was from London, England. And they called him two fingers because he only had two fingers on each hand, which wasn't actually true. He had two thumbs on each hand, but they didn't call him Tommy two thumbs because St.

Louis already had a Tommy two thumbs. Tommy two thumbs no chance. That guy was called no chance because we tried to beat him in a game of thumb wrestling. You had no chance of winning because you know, he had two thumbs to your one thumb. And that's why he was a Missouri state thumb raston champion from 1906 to 1935. They like to wrestle. I like to tell me a two thumb rastle guy. Well, sorry, cheeky Taylor, but he's not real. Sorry, me too. I think I had a small stroke about the time I said Tommy two fingers to keep up because that's when I started to lie again.

It's back up just a bit. During one of our street performances in front of the book, he watched in theater. Josephine Cautie, I, the theater's manager, whose real name was red, Burnett. That's right. Now we're talking truth again. Years later, red would recall first seeing Josephine saying she was a bitty thing, standing there singing to the people, she had a lovely voice and kind of handled herself like Diana Ross. She was just that thrilling. He made a mental note that as soon as he got the chance

he'd find something for her to do and help her out in the theater and take her off the streets. His opportunity came a few weeks later when the weekly show with the theater was being given by a touring troop called the Dixie steppers. Their producer Bob Russell had a problem. His troop was short and act. During the previous week's bookie in Kansas City, his husband and wife comedy team had fallen out with each other so badly that they'd split both personally and professionally. Gone their separate ways.

Now we need it a replacement. A Bernetta once thought of the Jones family band. Old man Jones was sent for the whole family, including Josephine was worked into the show the band was scheduled to perform two spots and during one of them Josephine would do a little comedy dance. And her dancing was a hit. She'd later say seeing everybody looking at me electrified me as if I had a sluggish in. You know, as a touring comic for coming up on 20 years, totally get it. Man, a good crowd can make you feel well when you're sick, make you feel rested when you're exhausted. And if you're already feeling good, can make you

feel like the most alive you've ever felt. And as Red Burnett proudly recalled years later, the minute she hit the stage, she arched her back just like an animal. She, she jut that ass up like a rooster flipping his tail. She was a natural. By now at the age of 14, Josephine's huge repertoire of steps, her leggy goofiness and her face pulling her, you know, Megan O'Silly faces, was beginning to develop into a style entirely her own, she was a true original, never sticking to a set routine. She didn't really know any set routines. Instead, she just kind of jumped into whatever next step

felt right. She was just completely improvised her dances in the spirit of the music, just like a proficient jazz player could do. She became like this living dancing embodiment of jazz, of the jazz era to many. She jumped from one appropriate routine to another like a good blues guitar, she was using the right scales,

kinda whip up the appropriate solo on the fly for whatever key the song was in. Producer Bob Russell was amused enough by Josephine's dancing to hire her and the Jones Family Band to stay with the troupe for the rest of its tour. She happily accepted how cool she's going on tour. Think about where she was just a few years ago.

Be and sent out by her mom to be a child maid and sleep in a cellar with a three-legged dog, no fence, both jangles. Sleeping in a bed with her entire family, choosing to lay on the floor with the fucking rats to get away from the smell of her stepdad's feet, using newspapers for blankets. She's no longer going to have to eat old discarded fruit nails, no longer going to have to steal little chunks of coal to make a couple pennies for the family. And those late days of Vodville, there were hundreds of acts touring theaters all over America.

They were mostly booked by a few big agencies, assembling shows and sending them out on the road. The big white bookers at the time were the United Booking Office, uh, Booking Office. Yeah, run by BF Keith and Edward Albee, an agency long defunct now and the William Morris Agency, which is very much still around. Uh, William Morris merged with another talent company a few years back as now known as William Morris Endeavour or sometimes just as Endeavour. I remember meeting William Morris agents early in my career to comedy festival in South Beach and Florida, desperately wanting them to want to sign me. They did not dang it.

Oh my heck. Luckily many years later, UTA would sign me and I love work with them. And William Morris can suck my dick. Not better at all. Not better. No bitterness. Black performers 1920 had their own agency. The theater owners booking association known as toba, which functioned mostly

in the South and Midwest hiring blacks to play only two blacks. Very segregated. It was toba that was handling the Dixie stepper's tour. Toba would die with the great depression not that many years later. Some of the theaters at which the white Valleys played were pretty terrible, but the places where the black performers played were always worse. Many were rickety wooden shacks, often with leaking roofs, broken seats. Sometimes members of the audience had to sit on the floor, but the dixie steppers made the best of whatever venue they were performing in. Man, my god.

Reminds you of these, my early stand-up years. Most road comics, a term for comics that travel and do shows all over the country, supposed to comics who tend to stick into one or two markets like New York or LA, where they where they do stand up at night, but usually do something else from the day like work as the writer or actor producer. Well, anyways, a lot of road comics when I got started traveling in late 2000, early 2001, we get paid first to tour working one nighters. Essentially a one nighter is any venue that decides to have comedy either one show a week or, you know, even less like once a month. As opposed to a comedy club, it's a performance space dedicated to comedy, dedicated to multiple nights of comedy a week. And the term one nighter can be applied

to all different kinds of venues, a hotel lounge with a little radio, Shaq, shitty mic and a little four by four, two-foot tall platform in the corner next to the karaoke machine can be the stage for a one-nighter. That that can mean elke's lodge that decides to give comedy night, you know, a chance, a night club dance floor where you do an hour of comedy before an 80s night DJ comes on, can be a one-nighter. They're fucking terrible. They tend to be ran by people who don't understand entertainment at all. They don't understand, you know, how lighting works, how to have a decent sound system, how turning the goddamn baseball game off in the middle of the show off at the big screen is important, how this should maybe tell customers to shut the fuck up during the show.

I performed in rough bars like the eight ball and great follows Montana, not sure if it's even still there. People in the crowd would literally be arm wrestling like it was a bad 80s movie where people are playing pool 20 feet from the stage where fights are breaking out. I've known comics to get literally attacked on some of these stages, like literally beat up on stage. The bottom rung of the stand up circuit is hell, but when you're young and you're just getting going, it's also exhilarating because you're on some level in the entertainment business.

Showbiz, right? You're getting paid to perform. And I have a lot of fond memories now, those early struggles, you know, of paying those dues. And I imagine that the gigs and Dixie now with those early struggles, you know, of paying those dues. And I imagine that the gigs and Dixie stoppers, steppers, you know, we're playing, we're kind of the equivalent of these gigs. I'm probably worse, I'm sure worse.

Obviously the travel accommodations are worse because of rampant segregation and racism. But you know, for Josephine, it's probably, you know, that mixture of like, oh, God, this is a dump, but also exciting. I'm doing it. The star of the show in which Josephine found herself was a singer named Clara Smith,

one of the string of fine Vodville blues singers with the last name of Smith who around at the time. It was Clara, Mami, Trixi, Bessie, none of them related. Josephine was getting nine bucks a week on the road. You know, quite a bit for a girl who was exhilarated to win that one dollar, that one time, right? She was, you know, still too small and scrawny to join the chorus. Not long after joining the tour producer Bob Russell decided she should be Clara Smith's

dresser and have, you know, one little comedic dance in the show. She was delighted for both. She idolized Clara whose voice she said later would give her, give her chills. Blue singers like Clara were the hot new thing in 1920. A nationwide craze kicked off by Mammy Smith's record crazy blues. That record sold so many copies in Harlem that the record company sent a man there to make sure that somebody wasn't simply giving him away. These sold so fast, it felt like they were giving him away.

The blues was hot. Clara then 26 acted like a star, she had a big personality. She knew that part of a star's job was to act glamorous, both on stage and off. Josephine loved it. And Claire quickly acquired a real affection for Josephine. They took to spend in their afternoons together where Claire would help Josephine improve a reading and writing, would buy her little gifts, licorice, peppermint sticks and sweet potato pie.

It was the nicest anyone had ever treated her. In April of 1921, after ping ponging around the country, Josephine's little show made it to Philadelphia for their final performance. It was out this show that the future famous famous chorus girl, got to perform as a chorus girl for the very first time filling in for an injured dancer. However, because Josephine's still only 14 was very skinny, they didn't have a costume that they would fit her. The smallest costume they had was still way too big and baggy for, and when she put it on, she looked like a clown. Look at a little girl playing dress up, which in a way she was.

And when she popped that on stage at the end of the chorus line, the audience burst out into laughter. And rather than get embarrassed, this is so cool. These little moments people have in their lives. When they could fold and it could send things spiraling in one direction or they could adapt and ride to the occasion and it sends their life

on an entirely new trajectory. Rather than get embarrassed, she embraces the laughter. Just like when those kids are making fun of her in school, when she's a little kid and she decided to make funny faces and just control the laughter, she does the same thing here. And she starts hamming it up and intentionally dancing, even goofier, making funny faces with her silly costume

and the crowd fucking loved her. Aided up and that performance helped lead to another show being produced in Philly, which would lead to everything else. A show where she got to be the comedic chorus girl when the rest of the Dixie steppers took off tour. And again, Josephine stayed in Philly. And it was there in Philly where she would meet her second husband, Willie Baker, two husbands, two willies. She loved to Willie. But you get a vavel joke.

Coming in. Okay. Willie was a small, wiry black 25 year old man who had previously worked But I'm boom, you get a Vodville joke. Kevin, okay. Willie was a small, wiry, black 25 year old man who had previously worked as the horse jockey. Was I always finding that as an interesting job? I'm pretty sure that, I don't know, I'm not positive, I'm pretty sure that Reverend Dr. Joe Paisley, who produces the suck here if I didn't think of the beginning, I think he used to work as a horse jockey a couple years ago. I know that he was either a disc jockey or a horse jockey.

I get confused because based on experience, I would say disc jockey based on overall physical size, I would say horse jockey. He was a jockey of some kind. Anywho. Steamboat. I'd do that for me. Steamboat Willie Baker was done with horses by the time he met young Josephine, only 15, and he was working as a railroad porter, which gave him a nice steady income. Again, different

times, 25 year old date and a 15 year old, you know, no one's batting the night, whatever. Paralopes quickly after meeting, no church ceremony this time around, but you know, this time it's legal. They go to the courthouse in Canada, New Jersey, get a wedding certificate. Despite being legal, this marriage wouldn't last much longer than the first one. After getting married, the two moved into a small boarding house set up for local theater performers within months to get hitched. Josephine gets lead on an audition for a new musical called Shuffle Along. It was being workshops and filly before going on to Broadway in New York City. And Josephine decided if she got to part that she wanted, she would head to

New York, biggest theater town in the USA, if not in the world. Well, she didn't get it initially. They felt her skin was too dark, preferring lighter skin black girls for the chorus line because the show is performed for white audiences this time. Now this stung for Josephine because as a kid, she felt like the odd man out with her family for being too light skinned, right? She just couldn't get it right for anybody. Now she didn't get to part, she did become obsessed with getting the part. Tenacity, that's the word they throw around a lot now for kids in grade school in junior high.

Tenacity. You got to be tenacious. If you want to accomplish something great, you have to persist in the face of adversity. Well, Josephine was a tenacious motherfucker, a study in tenacity. Her new husband didn't want to move to New York City, so she said she'd moved there without him. That's exactly what she did. And they'd soon part ways. She followed the show's progress as it moved from Philly to New York and it became a huge hit. Shuffle along became such a success at 63rd Street where it's theater, the 63rd Street theater was located, had to be converted into a one-way street to handle all the additional traffic. Josephine left Willie and Philly a few months into their marriage, headed out to New York City. Not even she didn't get the part. She just wanted to audition again

She didn't have any friends in New York and before I auditioned She had to sleep on a bench in Central Park for a couple nights in a row to sleep out in the outdoors It was brave crazy stupid courageous insane Yeah, and she did it This time she made it into the chorus line. Her starting wages now $30 a week. Think about that. She's sleeping on a bench, Central Park, getting ready for the biggest audition of her life, and she nails it.

And she gets $30 a week over three times what she'd made with the Dixie Steppers. She also had the line of the producer to get it to the part, say I had to say she was 17 instead of, you know, her real age of 15. And now that she was in this show, she stole it. She was the comedic relief chorus line audiences adored her. She had it. You could already see, you know, she was the star of the making. While the rest of the audience, you know, or while the audience, excuse me, loved the rest of the chorus line hated her. They were jealous and spiteful. Some of the other dancers would actually push and trip her as she went out on stage

trying to sabotage her act, but they couldn't phase the girl who slept in that St. Louis cellar. She was unflapable. The flapper girl who's unflapable, when they tripped her, she would incorporate the stumble into just some improvised gag, just make it funny, the delight of the crowd. The other girls despised her also because she was darker skinned and they were and they nicknamed her monkey, which is a little bit offensive, the races. They played tricks on her, like taking all of her makeup and costumes, you know, just again, just trying to sabotage her career. As a black woman living in the first decade of the 20th century, man, she was so just

heartened by this. She had seen plenty of white on black racism. Now she's seen a lot of black on black racism. Corus members started getting on course, specifically because of her, right? She's not going to let them get her down. Reviewers start singling her out for, you know, praise her. People start asking the box office, whether the cross-eyed girl, when she'd make that funny face at the end of the chorus line was still in the show.

Now they wanted to make sure that she was there before they bought a ticket. Producers of other shows in New York noticed her, start talking to, you know, about having her join one of their productions. Her star is on the rise. Some big-time theater producers, Noble Sistle and Ubi Blake are going to lead a big touring company about having her join one of their productions, her stars on the rise, some big time theater producers, noble sisal and you be Blake.

We're going to lead a big touring company to perform shelf the long around the country here about Joe seem to decide to scout her out for their touring show. They were too hard at work on a new musical, a racetrack comedy adventure called in Bamville to go and see Joe speaking themselves. So they sent an experienced old time song and dance scout from their office to check her out And you be always remember how excited this guy was when he came back because he said he came running back to us He said get that girl. She's the greatest thing I've ever seen get her It was a side of that when the number one company of shuffle long finishes run at 63rd Street theater went on the road

Josephine would join it. Build as the comedy chorus girl. The show finishes New York City run August 19, 22 after over 500 performances immediately set off with Josephine to play the Selwyn Theater in Boston. And the show is a huge hit in Boston. Sell out after sell out for four months. They could have kept going, but they finally had to leave because another production that was scheduled to perform in the same theater, you know, it you know, said that they weren't going to get out and give them their, you know, pre-ordained dates or the dates they registered for, they were going to sue them. Josephine's now making $35 a week, more than all of her other relatives combined, who,

you know, they were making back in St. Louis. She turned 16 in Boston, having the time for life. She's successful. She comes so far in such a short amount of time. After Boston, the show moves to Chicago for four months, sells it out there. Then Des Moines, Indianapolis, then back to St. Louis selling out all over the place. She'd later say that obviously she was excited to see her family, but when she made it back to the family home, it made her super sad, depressed, ashamed.

She was appalled by the contrast between the world she had left just so recently in the world she now inhabited. She really, truly noticed how filthy her old neighborhood in home where she was embarrassed by how she'd lived. She noticed how cold the unheeded home was. She saw the same old laundry tub that she used to bathe in the one with the dirty, room temperature bathwater already used by her stepfather, mother and three siblings. She remembered how much she fucking hated living in St. Louis. I get to see things in a different way on some level. Experience changes your perspective as you get older in life and go through new things.

When I first moved to Spokane, Washington from Riggins, Idaho, Spokane seemed enormous, enormous, like this big cosmopolitan metropolis. I lived in Las Vegas, my freshman in sophomore year's a high school, but I didn't have a car, and I rarely left my neighborhood. So I really didn't experience much of this city. I've been in Anchorage, Alaska when I was very young, don't remember much of that, you know,

kindergarten, first, second grade. That was about it. I've been to Los Angeles one time for literally one day, when I was 12. Been to Salt Lake City for part of one day. Drove through Phoenix with my dad once for, you know, as long as it takes to drive through a city. And that's it, you know, I've never been to any other cities, never been east of Mississippi. I'd never been east Idaho. The overwhelming majority

my child who was based in Riggins and compared to Riggins, Spokane felt like Tokyo, you know, and then my junior year of college, I got to spend a semester in London, England. And that city blew my mind huge, you know I had to learn how to use the subway, took trains and public buses for the first time. When I returned to Spokane, that same big city felt so small and in and in adequate. And then when I returned to Riggins, I almost couldn't believe I lived in this tiny little town of 400 plus people. My old home suddenly felt so foreign and small. I went from a city full of history museums, a huge theater district, nightclubs, tens of thousands of bars, pubs, entertainment everywhere went from a city full of history museums, a huge theater district nightclubs, tens of thousands

of bars, pubs, entertainment everywhere. Everything a city could offer it had. And now I'm back in a town where the only grocery store is about a third the size of Walgreens, right? And has far less than a Walgreens would have. It's not even a bow and alley or a stoplight. And I wanted to get the fuck out. Felt so small. Suddenly I felt, it felt claustrophobic. I mean, you know, now that I knew what existed elsewhere, even visiting there felt like being, suddenly I felt claustrophobic. I mean, you know, now that I knew what existed elsewhere, even visiting there felt like being trapped. I wanted the energy of that city again. And I feel a little different now, by the way.

Now I like the mix of both the city and the country. I get to experience both. But I think I relate a tiny bit to what Josephine must have felt, seen her own stomping ground again. You know, and I get how she felt about her actual home, too. You know, I had a great home when I was a kid and a little part of Riggins called North Ricons. It's my grandparents' home, but, you know, I had a great home when I was a kid and a little part of Riggins called North Ricans. It's my grandparents home, but you know, it's like my home too. And it seemed like such a magical, it was such a magical place growing up.

Clean, nice new TV, new fireplace, well-maintained little yard with the decorative hedge, ditch, garden and deck overlooking the river. My grandparents no longer own that home. The home I used to live down the street from, the neighborhood I spent over half my childhood in. A place that used to seem so big when I rode my first bike around the block. A place that seemed so vibrant and alive. And then when I gave my mother-in-law a tour of this little block about two years ago, man, did it seem small and depressed and run down.

Like if you saw it in a documentary, it would be used as an example of rural, blight poverty. Junking a lot of the lawns, old busted up cars. Only about one in three yards have actual green grass. The houses are so tiny, paints peelin' everywhere. The road isn't paved, it's gravel and dust. No sidewalks, no civic pride.

None of the trees are pruned or trimmed. I'll always have a special place in my heart that little slice of the earth, but compared to any neighborhood where at least half the people living in it, at least kind of give a shit about their how their property looks, yeah, it's a dump. And I imagine Josephine must have felt this time is a hundred, right?

She probably felt like an alien in her old home. She'd change and evolve so much. She seemed so much since she left St. Louis. Well, she'd never see, she wouldn't see her family again after leaving St. Louis for 14 years. She'd send money home on a regular basis to make sure her siblings were taken care of, but you know, after that, she had no interest in going back. Josephine's dad, Eddie, he showed up in St. Louis at an after party at the old show first club at one of her shows. And because he was a piece of shit, he tried to use his daughter's name

to get hired on as a production drummer. They said, no, and Josephine would never see her father again. Shuffle along went on to play Louisville, Lexington, Toledo, Grand Rapids, Detroit, Buffalo, Rochester, Atlantic City, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, even Prairie, Peoria. It was a huge hit. She made a lot of money. In the summer of 1923, the company had a short layoff and the show's producers threw now 17-year-old Josephine into a new production of theirs as one of the leads.

That musical they were working on earlier, that Bam Bamville was now ready to go into rehearsal. And Josephine was to be one of the principal stars in a part specially designed for her. She was now getting paid 125 bucks a week, an amazing sum for those days. She would be billed as the highest paid chorus girl in the world. Think about how quick she's rising.

The show would be a bit of a flop, but it would still run on Broadway for four months, the and tour for several months in various other locations after that. Man, two years ago, she'd make a nine bucks a week and that was big money. Five years before that, she'd do an odd chores and hopes making 50 cents a day. 125 bucks a week would put Joe Sphina's $6,500 for the year if she worked every week. Now, of course, she didn't, but it seems like she worked at least eight months, which would be over four grand for the year, based on some old IRS data I found that would put her well into the top 10% of the average household income of the day.

And she was doing that as a woman, a black woman, and a very racist sexist society, or she wasn't even allowed in a lot of stores, restaurants, hotels, and various parts of the country. And women had just received the right to vote a few years back in 1920. Variant inspirational, may of 1925, this new production, which had changed its name from Banville to the not at all race of sounding name, chocolate dandies, have now folded. Joseph Feen, who is now well known in New York City theater circles, took a job as a hostess, and the also not racist sounding at all Broadway nightclub named the plantation theater restaurant. Oh, names are a little dicey. Oh, my heck. The plantation master chocolate dandy salary of $125 a week.

And I didn't pick these names. Just remember that little note about these nightclubs in cities all across the world, where there were theater scenes, elegant nightclubs were bringing up to cater to the theater crowd after they'd left the theater for the evening. They would keep the party going until late late in the evening, until the early morning, more singing, dancing and drinks and merriment. I mean, this is a flip and roaring twenties after all. Flapper girls, martini's good times. A lot of theater stars would go, you know, sing and dance.

Some more of these clubs after their show is a double dip. You know, meant more money for the performers and of course, they helped draw in a crowd for these clubs. I mean, if you're a big fan of a show, how cool would that be? To go watch the person you just watched put on the show in a more intimate setting. You know, you can see them, maybe even talk to them, maybe dance with them, have a drink with them. It's basically the equivalent of going to a movie and then after the movie hanging out of the club with like James Franco or Matt Damon or Charlize Theron or the rock or Kevin Hart or something. I can crazy. The roaring 20s man, they were crazy.

And we're a wild time, novel time. In the 1920s, for the first time in US history, more Americans lived in urban areas than rural ones. City living with suddenly where life was at, Shobis, the economy doubled in size. Suddenly people had a lot of disposable income, more than they'd ever had before. And they wanted to have fun with that money.

Hence all the music, theater, nightclubs. Also thanks to nationwide advertising campaigns that spread a chain stores, people were culturally connected across the country now like never before. People across America, you know, listen to the same music, did the same dances, even used the same slang like they never had before. 1920 slang by the way, maybe my favorite era of slang, they went nuts with it. They got real into their slang. That sounds like berries to me.

Don't take any wood niggles. And give that flower flush with some giggle water and pull the haybanner around. We got some hot tea touchy choice bits of calico to get zozled with. Now let's blouse. And you got to have fun and have a good time. Also women were allowed to behave in mainstream society like never before in the 1920s. These flappers, these young women with bob hair and short skirts, they drank, smoked, spoke crudely and candidly were more sexually free than previous generations. Shebhars getting

loose with the body mugged. A period called the jazz age also coincided with the Rohren 20s. The jazz age would roll into the 30s as well. The jazz age refers to the initial nationwide explosion of the music thought up on the Mississippi River, you know, down towards New Orleans, but also in between St. Louis and New Orleans. Radio is blasting out jazz from radio stations and homes nationwide for the first time in the 1920s. Now, basically, something to say, 20s were the most fun time to be alive in America ever up until that point. It was a great time for just someone like Josephine Baker to have the talents and interests that she did. However, no matter how famous she got, she still was black and

what was an extremely racist nation. She was still haunted by the St. Louis race rides in 1917. Every time she wasn't allowed in a business or overheard a racial slur, white audiences may have adored her, but also many of them, you know, wouldn't let her in their homes. It wouldn't see her as an equal. It saw her as a fun novelty. The mainstream culture of white America wasn't willing to totally embrace a black woman. And then in 1925, an opportunity popped up for Josephine to find a place that would embrace her. To take her career further outside of America. A talent scout named Caroline Dudley had come to New York to perform,

or excuse me, to put together a cast for a new French production in Paris. come to New York to perform, or excuse me, to put together a cast for a new French production in Paris. And Caroline offered to double Josephine salary to $250 a week far more than she would ever be able to make in an American production. Basically that was the equivalent of getting a job offer, you know, for a job that paid over $200,000 a year. Now that's what the inflation calculator is saying, but I bet it felt like more than that even.

And Josephine took it and she went on to become by far the most internationally famous black woman in history. She went on to become the early 20th century equivalent to Beyoncé, but in some ways more famous because she was the first to do what she was doing. She's a pioneer in different ways. It's like she was Beyoncé and Michelle Obama and Donnie Luno for you modeling history and fans all rolled into the same person. But I'm going to head of myself.

1925 Josephine went to Paris, appeared in the show that opened on October 2nd at the theater, De Shamp-Elise, La Revue, Negre. She performed in two different numbers during the same show that was basically a jazz musical, showing Parisian, the artistry of African cultures. If this musical is performed today, people would lose their fucking minds about the, you know, over the top racist European depiction of African life, but it doesn't seem that the French meant to be racist. Was there some racism? Yes, not nearly as much as in America,

but yes, over the years in France, Josephine would date and fall in love with a few men who would, you know, she would later claim not marry her because she was black. However, it also seemed like a lot of other men would have killed their own families for the chance to marry her. So, you know, like they're usually is, you know, there was mixed reactions. She also felt, would later say that she never felt afraid in France because of the color of her skin. And it seems that France had a fixation with African culture in the 1920s, focusing on primitive jungle life, not on any kind of urban African life, for any kind of African intellectualism.

In her first, you know, production, Josephine danced a manic version of the Charleston while accompanied by a jazz band. Now, the Charleston was one of those many dance crazes that swept America and apparently no one could dance at Charleston like Josephine Baker. She received many a standing ovation for her Charleston dance renditions, but it was her second routine she did for this performance, dance, savage, that blew the audience's minds. In this dance number, in the risqué French Cabernet style of the theatrical presentation of the day, Josephine appeared practically nude. She performed an erotic dance topless with a male dancer named Joe Alex to close the

show in the crowd when wild. This dance was a huge sensation. The talk of the town, as they say, in a catapult of Josephine to almost immediate stardom in Europe. And this now infamous routine, Josephine wore strings of pearls, riskuffs, a skirt made out of 16 rubber bananas and not much else and not make it out of the banana part, by the way. Just saying that because I know you guys know about some banana stuff I've talked about. I know that you know that I think it's

a sexy fruit sweet and sexy and anapyles, but she really did wear this nanoscirt. Josephine was no longer the goofball of the production. The dirty kid from grade school who wore the same outfit for a year and got made fun of all the time was now Transforming from comedic relief to sex symbol Now 19 years old still very thin. She'd gotten some womanly curves. She was beautiful She was majestic. She was sexy, especially when she danced. Hey, Luciferina Josephine descended from a palm tree on stage to start her Don Savage routine Then she began to dance her hips starting to gyrate. Almost feels like a sexier version of twerking. You can find a video on YouTube of her doing this dance.

She's amazing. Has this perfect dancers body, lift, and agile? Even an old grainy footage where everybody moves too fast because of a frame rate translation issue. She's still elegant. Much more than sexier, beautiful. She's magnetic. She exuded star power.

You can see and feel how her smile would control a room. Such an interesting, intangible, by the way, star power. Some people have it. Some people don't. Josephine reminds me of former suck subject, Marilyn Monroe in this respect. They both just had it. This, this intangible. Josephine had more it than Marilyn, I think, did it even in Paris went wild for the poor girl from St. Louis as did Europe. Josephine's success also coincided with the exposition deco-teeths, some other world's fair that Paris had, one that gave birth to the term art deco. And this world fair brought about a renewal of Parisian interest in non-Western forms of art, especially African art.

Paris, when she arrived, was obsessed with everything African and Baker was in the city's collective opinion. The best thing Africa had to offer, the most exciting, sexiest export, even though she was, you know, not even from Africa, but Paris is the dance she would later say in I am the dancer. Yes, she was like the mascot, the hero of Paris. All over the city, she went to parties dressed in the height of the latest Parisian fashion now. She was adored to these parties, shown in an instinctive natural affinity for the famous and powerful, feeling at home amongst celebrities. The kings and queens of her childhood imagines no longer seem quite so remote.

She was with the crem de la crem of society, the upper crust, and they adored her. She would never bathe in anyone else's bathwater ever again. As the negative review, enjoyed increasing success, Josephine was lavished with gifts from fans, including fancy ballgowns and jewelry. She lived in a two bedroom suite in the hotel for net. It's a beautiful hotel. She began to live like the queen. She dreamed about as a child. She bought herself a collection of dolls, something she'd wanted since she was a kid, named each one. Shortly after moving into her suite, she also indulged her love of animals by going nuts.

She started buying parakeets, parrots, a couple of rabbits, snake, baby pig. She named the pig Albert after her hotel's dormant, be switched by Josephine. He was delighted. I don't need, you know, by the pig, but by all of her other creatures. Stemling this little zoo in her hotel room. Josephine was not only performing in the review, review, Negrat, she and the band from the show were also hired to appear late each evening after the show and one of these clubs we talked about.

This one was the famous Mulan Rouge, right, making even more money, working on one of the most famous cabernet music halls in the world, a place I'd heard about before the suck. And I didn't know shit about this world. These legit, super famous in Paris, the run of a review, Negra, was extended twice eventually the pressure of other upcoming bookings forced it to close after seven weeks, and then it just went on to play in other theaters around the city for the rest of the year. By the end of the year, it felt like everyone in Paris had seen this show at least once.

The whole cast would have been happy to stay in Paris forever, but produced her Caroline Dudley wanted to capitalize on its success by taking it out on tour. She booked them to appear for six weeks as the last act on the bill at the Cirque Royale and Brussels. After that, they played six weeks at the Nelson Theatre in Berlin, followed by another six weeks in Moscow. After Paris, Brussels was relatively uneventful. But again, the show was a massive hit. And again, Josephine was singled out by the critics and public for a claim. One show in Brussels was even attended by the king of Belgium, King Albert.

And this was the first for Josephine, her first royal performance. She really was with royalty now. Then they went on to Berlin. And in many ways, Josephine liked Berlin, even more than Paris. The bright, brash nightlife of Berlin felt like more like America than Paris did, more like the nightlife of the Chestnut Alley back in St. Louis. But at the same time, very different. The review Negrot was almost as great a success in Berlin as it had been in Paris. Josephine was again a huge sensation. Her onstage near nakedness appealed to a growing German nudist movement.

What did this is something I made up? A lot of Germans were thrown off their clothes in their homes and health clubs in 1925, believing that the air on their body was more natural in health giving, that a freer life would help release pressure and relieve people, you know, from the neurosis, is arising from the pressures of modern society. And why does that sound so very German for some reason? In the Berlin nightclub world, Josephine would later recall, when I walked in, the musicians would stop playing.

They stood up and saluted me. I mean, how cool is that? To get that reaction to the country she's just shown up in. Josephine would later recall when I walked in, the musicians would stop playing. They stood up and saluted me. I mean, how cool is that to get that reaction to the country she's just shown up in? She was invited to all the smart cafes and clubs and dances and parties and Berlin, she had a blast. May have also indulged quite a bit and Berlin's free and open sexually liberated

nightlife environment, hooking up with a variety of German clean wines, get it Josephine, live it. Strange to think that is same sexually liberated and racially tolerant city would soon succumb to the rise of Nazism. Right, they'd go from adoring a black woman to being furious that a black man named Jesse Owens was allowed to run in the 1936 Olympics in just a decade.

March 1926 Josephine's still not even 20 years old returns to Paris. She'd been cast to perform and argued with the most famous performance space in the world at that time, the Fale Bargette, music hall, and is set called La Fale de jour. Originally built as an opera house, this cultural institution is still in business, still a strong symbol of French and Parisian life. Baker again dances topless, again wearing a skirt made out of bananas.

The show is wildly successful with some performance tweaks. It's even more successful than her last Parisian run. Baker becomes one of the most popular highest paid performers in Europe. It's a huge production over half a million dollars went into set design and costumes. Author such as Ernest Hemingway, EE Cummins become huge fans. Baker is nicknamed the black Venus, the black pearl, the bronze Venus. By mid 1926 Josephine Baker became the most famous woman in Paris by far, black or any other color.

She may have been the most famous person in France or in Europe, period. Photographs of her were selling everywhere. She was believed at the time to be the most photographed woman in the entire world. Dolls of her dress and her banana skirt, bought by the thousands. God knows what I would have done to one of those.

Cocktails and bathing suits, hairdressing products were named after her. Her glowing coffee-colored skin mesmerized Parisians who now wanted to look like her. She was paid by the company making Valais water lily beauty cream to let them feature her in their advertising. A shop window in a local Parisian store had a giant moving doll of her alongside a sign that said, you can have a body like Josephine Baker if you use Valais cream. To many young French women, she became a symbol of liberation, liberated, you know, women's rights. She was a symbol of sexual liberation for women. Paracism, impressive artist, artist community also was in love with her.

She posed for Picasso numerous times and many other famous artists, artists, saying years later that Picasso did not see the outside but saw inside. He was very intense and very strong. He pulled you to him. And then like indulged celebrities do, she started to get a little weird from time to time. Maybe not great for one's mental health to be getting a cell famous so fast. She starts showing up late for her own shows, starts getting a little casual performances here in there. There's a story about her eating lobster in her dressing room when it was time to go on stage. And when the stage manager pounded on her door, she was annoyed, he interrupted her meal, and you know, he demanded that she go out and do her show, so she just took her lobster

on stage and ate it in front of the crowd. Who apparently thought it was just an odd part of the performance and somehow loved it. So, which makes her active and weirder. She's getting lots of extra animals, so many. She starts bringing them to the theater now. They would find rabbits nested in the war droves, white mice in the drawers, cats, dogs, and birds, fucking everywhere. Baby tiger and a boa constrictor were some of the more exotic animals. She brought to her job. She brought a young goat and a pig into theater. She said later she'd find animals more trustworthy

than people and would have a variety of pets for the rest of her life. And I hope I make it that big for just a little while. Like how fun would it be to be allowed to get that weird? I just wanna be big enough. I don't need to bring a tiger. I just wanna be big enough to have my doodles. Penny Pooper and Ginger Bell be slowly lowered

down to the stage during a stand-up show. I want to wear in little capes and crowns, sitting on little thrones. Maybe it even happens a long time from now and they're not even alive. Maybe they're stuffed, maybe they're not even weirder. But I used to, but I pet them and talk to them as if they still are alive throughout the show. That's why I know I've made it. When I get to do that kind of shit and still sell tickets. Josephine cut her first music record in 1926. I actually listened to a ton of Josephine Baker, music while, you know, doing the research for this podcast.

You know, it's good. It's way different than what I usually listen to. She'd sing songs in both French and English. I think her most familiar song, at least to me, is Blue Skies. This is one from when she was, you know was young, just kind of getting going. Her voice is not as confident as strong as it would get later, but I still like it. Listen to this, this is a little bit of Josephine Baker, blue skies. I am blue just as blue as could be. Every day is a cloudy day for me.

Then good luck came knocking at my door. With the grainyness. And it was nice you can kind of quietly air-banging on the background to make it sound even nicer. Nothing too much, just a little. Just like, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, think, don't think, don't think, don't think, don't think. See, sometimes it's, you know, it's really sweet, you know, in the AirBangil in the background. But also, in 1926, Josephine met, but I really liked it.

I listened to her, yeah, ton this last couple of days, and there was just something about, I mean, her voice doesn't have a great range. It never got like super powerful, but there's just, I don't know, again, is that it factor? There's just something to it. It's like, yeah, I like that. I like listening to that. It doesn't help that she's, or I don't know, again, is that it factor. There's just something to it that's like, yeah, I like that. I like listening to that.

It doesn't help that she's, or it doesn't hurt me that she is propossiously attractive as well. That also never hurts. Also in 1926, Josephine met a strange little man named Giuseppe Abatino. A man who claimed to be from Rome was really from Palmero. A man who by trade was either a stone mason or possibly a brick layer,

but claimed to be royalty, claiming he was Count Pappito de Appatino. It was a character. He was a 37 year old dance instructor, part time Jidolot, described as being of average height with swept back dark hair, small mustache, and a dark and dark deep set eyes, same picture of him. He just, he's got an interesting look about him. Elegantly dressed, he sported a monocle, cigarette holder, carried a walking cane, he was handsome and suave,

fog of weird, crazy, and Josephine fell in love with him. He would quickly become her manager, also at times assistant, also her husband, she would never legally marry, because technically she was still married to Willie Baker. Oh, Willie number two, from back and Philly. Oh, Philly Willie. Josephine and Pepita would have an odd relationship. Some saw him as a parasite,

clinging on to Josephine using her for her money. Other saw him as a saint, always standing by Josephine when she'd have sexual affairs with a variety of other men that she did not try to hide from him and that he was not into. But they either had some kind of arrangement or he just fucking put up with it. In 1927, Baker starred in her first silent film called Siren of the Tropics, Shoted Pepito. This is why some people thought he was a little bit of a parasite. He gave himself three different pain jobs in this project. He was a producer, helped with direction,

and played a small role on screen, even though no one cared at all if he was in this movie or not. The movie tells the story of a native girl named Poppato, played by Baker who falls in love with the French man named André Berval. And to be honest, for me, it doesn't hold up. I couldn't keep paying attention to it for more than a few minutes at a time. But to be fair, I'm not someone who enjoys old silent movies from the 20s in general. I just, I don't think I've ever liked a single one I've watched. You know, compared

to now, they just, in my opinion, made super shitty movies. And I think, of course, they did. I don't buy it when people get really into that arrow film. Like, no, they're fucking terrible. They were just getting started. They didn't know what they were doing. I'm getting off track again. Despite not being a fan of wooden caption dialogue,

like, Papa also spoil you, the rent money. And if you do not believe me, you ask Bam Bula. It felt like they took the writers fucking ten minutes to write this entire movie. I will say Josephine is super graceful in it. Her body controls amazing. She makes dancing and complicated movements. Look as easy. Just walk in her breathing.

And she looks somehow, this is interesting about her to me, somehow very modern, to like an eerie degree. Like I feel like if it was in a horror movie, she would start talking directly to me. She looks like she has to be still alive somewhere. Does that even make sense? Sometimes I see old footage and I think, yeah, that looks like someone who lived a long time ago. That looks like someone who lived in a time before modern dental care and fine lotions. Someone who never got a chance to use sunscreen. Someone who never heard of a push up or a multivitamin. But some people I see and I think, you know, I'm sorry. Yes.

So those people I see and I think, yeah, old-timey person for Sherbin did a long time. But then other people I'm like, fuck, what? How is this footage from 100 years ago? Like, you look like you can be across the street right now. What Josephine, I think she looks like she can pop out of the screen and not only blend in today's modern society, but dominate it again, be it come a star again. Like she would crush Instagram. And even though I didn't love it, siren of the tropics did get positive reviews

from critics in the public alike. People in Sweden liked it so much that a doll was made of her and her likeness sold in Stockholm shops. Just, ooh, da, ooh, da, that's a nice adult, rubbing in the tug in the doll. Ooh, look at the doll, put it on your part. American movie producers in Hollywood also wanted Josephine to perform in their films

and she turned them down, which speaks to her star power. She was so successful in Europe. She loved living in France so much. She was like, ah, I don't fucking need Hollywood. 1928 Josephine and Papito set on a world tour of sorts, 24 cities in Europe and South America, back when he couldn't just buy direct flights or any kind of flights.

Back before motion sickness pills, no thank you. This is when Josephine would encounter some hardcore racism again. Now for the first time since she left America, the Nazi movement is getting stronger. It's growing along with other racially intolerant groups in Eastern Europe, also the Catholics protest her performances fiercely in some place like Vienna on the grounds of moral indecency. In Vienna, the Catholic Church actually held extra emergency masses directly prior to her performances as if her dancing around topless was going to rip open a portal to hell. Just I am here.

I just I satan. The dark titties have stirred me from my eternal slumber Jy-rating African hips mimicking the very natural and life of firm and active pro creation have pushed God himself To give me permission to bring forth an army of demons To punish you for allowing those dark titties to flop about in front of previously pure white men Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with so many people like the ridiculous shit? to flop about in front of previously pure white men. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with so many people? Like the ridiculous shit that people get worked up about make me so angry, just consistently. The Austrian parliament even voted as to whether or not she'd be legally

allowed to perform in their country, you know, and she was barely allowed by the government again, those dark titties, what a moral decadence might they unleash amongst the white folk? They'll watch one dance and just abandon the white families and start fucking each other in the street. When Joe is being returned to Berlin, where she previously been in a warmly embraced, Nazism had gotten a much stronger foothold. Nazi Heckler's starts showing up her performances, literally just yelling racial slurs at her in the middle of her fucking show, disrupting their performance, until Josephine couldn't stand

it, had to cancel her remaining performances. Munich outright bans her from performing all together, right? Can't risk getting those superior Aryan Dixhard might make those white men question there. Silly racist beliefs, if they get boners over those duck titties. Luckily elsewhere in Europe, she's received warmly. In Romania, the outdoor theater, Josephine dances her banana dance in the rain storm, tossing away her umbrella as part, as her makeup runs on her face, you know, getting poured on the costume disintegrates and the crowd goes wild. Scandinavian audiences also loved her.

Even though one Danish pastor had campaigned against her morality, he attended a performance and became so thoroughly converted that he stood up and shared. The Swedish royal family, excuse me, attended her performances including the crown prince Gustaf, to whom she's rumored. They've had a little romantic fling with the girl who dreamed of royalty. I may have had some royalty in her bedroom, which had to be kind of mind blowing. In Amsterdam, she did the Charleston and Dutch wooden clogs to the delight of the crowd. Josephine found controversy, controversy, again in South America in Argentina.

The Catholic parties protested her as immoral. The nation's president agreed, but then an anti-government party adopted her as a symbol of their ongoing political battles supported her. At one performance, both factions protested, gotten to a little fight and started throwing firecrackers at one another, which is a weird way to be angry at one another. It didn't involve into a real brawl. They just showed up and threw firecrackers at one another, like, like, M-80s and shit, I guess.

Ground men acting like weird ten year olds. Josephine returns to Paris. She's offered another starring role this time in another theater called Casino de Petty. And this show she would sing. She would sing and shows for the rest of her career. The songwriter Vincent Scotto would hire, was hired to write a romantic ballot just for her. They would compliment her voice and you know her modest range.

He wrote some French shit that translates to, I have two loves, referring to her love for both Paris and America. And it almost immediately sold 300,000 copies. Shortly after this, Paul Varne, one of the owners of the casino did paris, gifted Josephine with a tame cheetah. You don't know, and then she likes animals. Now she has a cheetah, she names Chiquita. She's living in a fucking zoo. She puts a collar on the cheetah.

The collar is adorned with expensive square diamonds so over the top. And she just walks her cheetah around Paris. And sometimes it would get loose. Luckily, it didn't make her kill anybody. On several different occasions, she brought it to theaters and it got away from her. And he gets one time jumped into the orchestra pit

and she's fucking terrorized the musicians. Also, this thing slept in her bed. Sle slept in the bed with Josephine and Pepito. And I guess Pepito wasn't a big fan. I bet not, man. Penny and Ginger sleeping bed with Lindsey and I, and I'm fine with that. But I would not be fine with the cheetah. The might slice up our faces at a moment of night. And where was the cheetah saying?

They weren't in the little hotel room anymore. Josephine and Pepito bought a 30 room mansion and an upscale suburb on the western bank of the sign river. It was named the beautiful oak because of the gorgeous oak trees that lined the long driveway. It looked almost like a fairy tale castle complete with pointed turrets, dormer windows, medieval shields. I mean, she is living like a royal life now. Each room in this place had its own theme from a Louis, the 14th bedroom, uh, to an Indian

room with temple bells. In a room next to the master bedroom, she installed cages for her monkeys in another room, uh, shed an avery for her parrots, parakeets, cockatiels, cockatudes, Roman the grounds for ducks, chickens, geese, fesins, turkeys, all sorts of flower gardens on the estate to the point that she hired full, uh, three full time gardeners to keep it all looking pretty. She also started a little vegetable garden herself. She worked on it was a long time dream of hers. I wonder how often she sat down and reflected how ridiculously far she'd come from her childhood

from rats to a French estate. And doing all of this well before the age of 30, I might add. In 1931, 1932 Josephine toured Europe extensively again, returned again to the casino de Paris, or de Paris for another long run of shows. 1933, she won on a world tour that briefly included parts of Asia and Africa. In 1934, Josephine started another film,

one called Zuzu, that was written specifically for her, to the extent that the main character was even named Josephine. That one was apparently really bad. No one liked it, but they still loved her. 1935 took another crack of the movies and did another film entitled Princess Tam Tam. It was also pretty bad and then she gave up on films. Camera acting required subtler expressions and movements and her instinct was always to go real big because that's what worked on the live stage. 1935, Fepito booked Josephine with the Ziegfried Follies

in a show that was to include Fanny Bryce and Bob Hope, the early famous American entertainer with musical numbers by Ira Gershwin. Josephine Baker would be the first black woman to appear in the Ziegfried Follies, and it turns out she'd also be the last. She and Fepito sailed to New York, where she was reminded that despite being a huge

star in Europe and South America, she was still a second class citizen in the States. She and Pepito took a cab to their hotel, the St. Moritz or Moritz, only to have the manager checked them in and then scold them and tell them that Josephine would never be allowed to walk through the lobby again. When an old lover of hers from Paris came to New York, Josephine spent several nights with him and a rented apartment and Harlem and P Papito, you know, didn't love it. He'd be getting increasingly frustrated and upset over her affairs. It was affecting his physical health and he returns to Paris.

And then a few months later, Josephine received news that Papito really did get sick and he died of cancer. He spent his last weeks tidying up her financial affair. So maybe he wasn't a parasite. Maybe he wasn't just trying to take her money. Maybe he really, really cared for her. It seems that he did. Josephine fell into a deep depression for months after his death. She arrived back in Paris on June 2nd, 1936, day before her 30th birthday. He wanted to celebrate the big three-out in Paris. She was lonely after Pepito's death. They never married legally because I said,

you know, she was still legally married to Philly Willie. Philly Willie Baker all those years. When she was in the US, she did obtain a legal divorce from him. She suddenly long to get married and have kids, but despite the fact that the French were less racist than Americans, more than willing to carry out affairs with her, most French men were not interested in marrying her, often due to family opinion on the matter of marrying a black woman

So you know sad that she's still in her beloved France and counted a fair amount of racism finally Josephine met a good look at an athletic 27 year old Jewish man named John lion Or Leon made this spelled lion pretty badass name John lion you met him at the stables where she wrote her horse tomato of course she also had a horse There's some of there's any animals she didn't have. John Lyon was a pilot. He taught Josephine to fly. She would actually obtain her pilot's license. And then John proposed Josephine on her 31st birthday

and they were married later in 1937. At her wedding, Josephine wore a top hat and a full length, a stable fur, and addressed the crowd saying, haven't we all got a heart? Haven't we all got the same ideas about happiness? Isn't the same for everyone, isn't it the same for every woman in love?

At the end of the ceremony, sportsmen fired their rifles and firemen to the their trombones. With this marriage, Josephine finally became a legal citizen of France after being beloved there for so many years. She told the gather press she was happy, but the marriage didn't go much better than the first two.

Their schedules were completely opposite and they didn't see eye to eye on how marriage life was going to work. Although, you know, John had been attracted by Josephine's flamboyant performer persona. He thought once they were married, she would settle down and be a typical French wife, attending to his clothes, meals, business, tanky notes, the kids. Although Josephine had long to be a wife and have a normal family life, she soon realized she could not leave the stage.

She also had a miscarriage, which put more strain on the marriage. When she found out Jean was having an affair, Josephine retaliated by having one of her own and then by 1939, their marriage was foundering and then they were divorced by 1940. In early September 1939, France formally declared war after Germany invaded Poland. Fucking Poland messing things up for France. Typical! You know how they would, Josephine was recruited into La Dayum Barou, Bureau, maybe, I don't know,

the French military intelligence organization, I know it's the French military intelligence organization, I don't like one of the works. They needed someone who could travel around and collect and disperse information without attracting attention. And Josephine made the perfect choice because of her touring. When Josephine was asked by the head of military intelligence, Jacques Abte to engage in this

work, she said, France made me what I am. I will be grateful forever. The people of Paris have given me everything. They have given me their hearts. I have given them mine. I am ready captain to give them my life. You may use me as you wish. She's a fucking spy now.

How cool is that? And her words make clear that not only was she motivated by her hatred of racism, but by her love of the Parisians and France. Josephine was told to use her social contacts to attend as many embassy parties as possible. Just appear carefree and frivolous, but keep an ear to the ground about German troop locations

and Italy's plans for entering the war. Every day, Josephine reported for work at the Red Cross Center in a rundown section of Paris to help prepare for refugees fleeing from Nazis, military intelligence, also told her to look for possible German spies amongst the homeless refugees. Once weak, Josephine flew a plane with Red Cross supplies to Belgium with the Red Cross. She also performed for the troops on the front lines. During the Christmases of 1939, she sent 1500 presents with a sign photo of herself to French soldiers on the front lines.

And I'm guessing if anyone had been measuring this specifically, they would have seen a giant spike in French frontline masturbation late that Christmas night. Like, you know, I'm right. If you're a dude or you know dudes, you know, you know, I'm right. As the Nazis invaded Holland and other countries to the north of France, in May 1940, increasing numbers of wounded flooded into Paris. Josephine helped tend to them through who read crosswork, also saying to them in the war, it's comforting them, entertaining them. In June 1940, German soldiers marched towards Paris, and though Germans did not exterminate blacks

as they did Jews, they did consider them inferior and had a forced sterilization policy in the Reinland. More over, Josephine was married to a Jew and a public outspoken critic of Nazism. So, as Parisians fled the city, Josephine did not want to go, but she was convinced that she would be of more use to the cause if she relocated to the south of France. Josephine went to live in a southern French chateau. She'd rented before the Germans officially occupied Paris on June 14, 1940. Soon the Germans were moving now to occupy the South of France and Josephine went to the neutral nation of Portugal, where she was struck with pneumonia. As she mostly recovered, she was warned of the impending

German occupation instructed to head to one of the French colonies in northern Africa. So Josephine sent a friend to travel north to her home near Paris to collect some of her animals, not going to let them be left behind, including three monkeys, two white mice, two white mice. That is pretty sweet. If you love mice, you're going to hate me saying this. I don't think I give a fuck about the mice. I'd be like, yeah, get the monkeys and the dogs.

What about the mice? Sssh, sshh. Eek. Brightest. You'll let them go. That'll probably be okay. As she got, she's like a patron saint of animals. Bojangles just told me she's his favorite subject that we've stuck so far.

She also managed to get passports for a Jewish film producer and several other refugees to help them get out and fly out of France safely. And she goes to Algiers from Algiers, Josephine relocates to Costa Blanca in Morocco. Josephine soon takes another trip to Portugal again pretending to be on tour. This time she's carrying information to transmit

on the margins of her sheet music. She would later say the destiny of our allies and consequently the free French was written in part over the pages of some of my music. When she returned to Morocco, she and some friends moved to the seaport town of Merikesh. Or I really want to go there. About that time, Josephine becomes pregnant again

from who no one knows and then suffers another miscarriage. And sadly, this one results in an emergency hysterectomy. She subsequently develops an infection that quickly becomes paratonitis and then septicemia. Antibiotics, not routinely available until the late 1940s, septicemia usually fatal. Luckily she does survive because she was a bad-ass mother sucker.

For the next two and a half years, she wrote in Jeeps over the deserts of North Africa entertaining allied troops under very rough conditions. She's staying in hospitals, bringing happiness and comfort to wounded soldiers. She began to tour and donate all the money she made very rough conditions. She's staying in hospitals, bringing happiness and comfort to wounded soldiers. She began to tour and donate all the money she made to France's Nazi resistance efforts. And by the auto of 1944, she had raised 3,143,000 francs for the war effort.

As a reward, she was given the honorary rank of the French Air Force, Le Fille des Le Air Issues de Uniform. On August 25th, 1944. Paris was liberated and then Joseph, Joseph, Josephine returned to Paris wearing that uniform of all the thousands of high fashion clothes and costumes she had worn and bought and been given. Josephine said it was this air force uniform that she was by far the most proud of. When Josephine returned to Paris, she was regarded as a heroine. Other performers have been accused of ties with the Germans during the Nazi occupied

France. In fact, one famous one, Maurice Chevalet, who was briefly arrested and interrogated, but Josephine resumed performing in Paris immediately. No one suspected her of having any ties. She started performing in France. As soon as German troops would leave each area, she would go do shows. When the German surrendered, Josephine went to Germany to sing for the inmates of the newly liberated Butch-en-Wald, who were too

sick to be moved, many of whom were dying. It was an experience so sad and tragic she would never talk about it. In 1946, Josephine fell in love again. This time with the band leader of the band who'd accompanied her on a lot of these military shows, Joe Boulon. They were married on June 3rd, 1947, on her 41st birthday in a civil ceremony and then a Catholic one. Josephine had been raised Baptist. Was sought to have converted to Judaism during her marriage to John Lyon or John Lyon, excuse me, but she had never been a Catholic. However, as Booion later wrote, for Josephine, God was in everything. I have seen her enter a cathedral, a synagogue, a mosque, a temple, and show the same respect. For her, it wasn't one religion or another, but simply the idea of God that was everywhere. I like that. Josephine appeared to have had

the same open mind and an accepting view of religion as she did of race. In December 1947, Josephine and Joe traveled to America where she appeared in a show called Paris Things Again. The American critics pan her, stating her costumes had more talent than she did in her performances. Man, fucking America, tough, not to crack. Josephine Baker, Josephine County, pervasive racism again in America, New York City, she and Joe had to go to 36 hotels before they found one that would allow a mixed race couple to stay under their roof. segregation still rampant. Josephine fought against every chance she got as one of her tour producers later said she used the drinking fountains, the lunch counters and the lady's room. They threw her ass out and she would walk right back in. Hail Nimra! Yeah, yeah!

Hail, Josephina! Josephine convinced her mother and sister to return to France on this trip by promising them they would experience a freedom they had never known in America. Before she left, Josephine spoke at Fisk University in all Black College and Nashville about the equality of the races in France. She went back to France with a renewed determination to fight racism in the U.S. In 1951, the management of Copa City, a nightclub in Miami tried to book Josephine while she was touring in Cuba.

She told them she would only perform if blacks were allowed to attend. They refused and then up their offer to $10,000 a week. And she told them that they could suck her fucking dick. Choke on it. You white devil fucks. No, she didn't say that. But she held her ground with class and dignity and refused to perform in a club that had forced segregation and she won.

Eventually, the club agreed to her terms and black celebrities were flown in for the opening gala night. Josephine said on stage, this is the happiest moment of my life. I have waited 27 years for this night. Here I am in this city where I can perform for my people where I can shake your hands. This is a very significant occasion for us, and by us I mean the entire human race. Beautiful. Josephine was a smashing success as time in America with rave reviews and the 750 seat clubs sold out every night. Warner Brothers hired to perform in major cities throughout the US live act between cinema shows. Critics raved about her. Josephine accepted bookings

in clubs across the U.S. and she used her tour to fight for civil rights, refusing to perform anywhere that did not admit blacks in the audience or racially discriminated in any way in their ticket sales. And ironically, she pulled this off in every city that she went to, except St. Louis. Her hometown wouldn't fucking back down. They would not allow any blacks into her audience. You know, if she was going to perform there, man, those fucking big hits couldn't make a deal with the girl who was born and raised in their city. In Los Angeles, in July, 1951, while making her last appearance on this US tour, Josephine was eating at the built-more hotel in a French Air Force uniform she was so proud of when she heard a man next to her say some really not-nice, super racist horrible stuff,

so I'm sure you can imagine the gist of it. And Josephine did not let it slide. She went to a phone booth called the police to have him arrested under civil rights statutes. They informed her they could not arrest her because an officer had not overheard the remark, but they would send an officer over and she could make a citizen's arrest if she chose, and that's exactly what she did. The man a salesman from Texas was sentenced by a judge to 10 days in jail or pay a hundred dollar fine for disturbing the peace, hail, Nimrod, price trip, a limb. Yeah, sure, that's St. Louis, who wants to share in some of this joy. Months later, while on tour in Argentina, Josephine makes some pretty scathing remarks about the United States and newspapers there, stating that it was a barbarous land with a Nazi-style

democracy in which blacks had no rights. And I can't blame her based on her experiences. In reaction, though, the US immigration service issues a policy statement that if she ever wishes to be admitted into the US again, she would have to prove, quote, her right and worth. And that is when she said, you can suck my fucking dick. Uh, no, no, she still didn't say that. I wish she would have though. She said to be barred from the US as an honor.

And then that quote was published in newspapers around the world, which didn't make, you know, people in the US were all happy. Disillusion with the America Josephine found comfort again in France, returning to her chateau in the South of France, which she now develops into a tourist attraction, complete with a J-shaped pool, huh? Deliciveine, okay, I get it. Hotel restaurant, the chateau includes a wax museum,

depicting events in her life from her childhood in St. Louis to her bananas skirt dance. Josephine increasingly wanted to turn her chateau into a private world where all races will be treated as equal. She also started adopting children. This is something she's really famous for. She wanted to create a rainbow tribe by adopting four children from each of the races with different religions proving that all humans could live in harmony together. And her husband, Joe, was agreeable to this plan. During an Asian tour in Japan in 1954, uh, Josephine adopts two boys, one Korean who came from a Buddhist family, one half Japanese, half American, who roots were in shintoism.

Performing in Scandinavia, she adopts a white two-year-old child in Norfolk and Helsinki. Helsinki. Yeah, Helsinki. Jesus. Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, don't have to speak Helsinki. There I can say it if I speak like this. This could have been born to Protestants. While touring Bogota, Josephine adopted a black child from a Catholic family.

She and Joe had agreed to adopt one more child, an American Indian child at this time. And Joe was getting a little bit like, ha, alright, this maybe slowed down a little bit. Then Josephine brought home a white Parisian orphan. Joe was upset, but Josephine managed to convince him to also adopt a Jewish child arguing that the Jewish people had suffered much racial discrimination. In 1956, along toward North Africa, she brought home two different Algerian children, the sole survivors of an air raid on their village. She raised one of them as Muslim, adding yet another religion to those among her adopted children. Again, Joe is upset trying to explain to her that they were spending too much money. She was spending the fastest she's making it. You know, these kids that

they already had were enough to raise what she wasn't done. She adopted an American Indian child, an event of Swala 1959. 1961, Josephine was inducted to the French Legion of Honor. She was made a night by Charles DeGal. The Legion of Honor had been established by Napoleon. And membership in it was one of the highest honors one could attain in French society. 1961 she was also starting to have some real money problems to support the many many children Josephine had to perform more than she wanted and the extra travel in addition to money problems and lots of kids put a strain on her marriage and they separated and he relocated to Paris. The attempt to trial reconciliation but it didn't work and around

Christmas 1959 newspapers ran stories of an infant found in a trash bin. Josephine rushed out, adopted another kid, naming him Noelle. And this time Joe was done. He didn't abandon all the kids. He later relocated Buenos Aires and four of the kids would live with him there. And you know what?

And I can't blame him for getting a little sick of that. I mean, Josephine's heart in the right place. But unless you're running an orphanage or a foster care house You can't just keep bringing home kid after kit Like like if Lindy started bringing random kids home. I would eventually I don't know my killer am I killer unless They were very good at doing podcast research and like keeping the lawnmower then, you know, I put them in charge of my kids 1962 Josephine adopted her final child, a French Moroccan girl, she ended up with a dozen, 10 boys, two girls, a lot of kids.

Without Joe to help her kind of run the money, manage it, Josephine's financial trouble has got worse between 1953 and 1963, it was estimated she'd lost seven and a half million francs and she was two million francs in debt. She started selling off her jewels. I mean, this place is shat-toe, I've seen pictures of it. I mean, it was opulent. A lot of money to keep this place up. A lot of people had to work there. Start selling off jewels to try and save it. Then she's threatened by her creditors in 1963 with its four sale around this time. The NAACP invites her back to America to participate in a demonstration. She also has

the opportunity to play Carnegie Hall with the proceeds split between the NWC NWACP and her attempt to savor Chateau. And how generous is she, by the way, still given half her performance money to charity, even though she's losing her house. Initially, Josephine has trouble getting back in the US because of those comments she'd made earlier, but Bobby Kennedy, the attorney general, Bobby Kennedy, personally seized her visa. On August 28th, 1963, Josephine participates in the March on Washington, the largest civil rights demonstration in America. When we talked about the Martin Luther King suck, she sat on the stage in her Air Force uniform

among the top civil rights leaders and celebrities of the day, including Martin Luther King, and it's wife, Karen, at Bob Dylan. When it was her time to speak, she said, you are on the eve of complete victory. You can't go wrong. The whole world is behind you. When it was her time to speak, she said, you are on the eve of complete victory. You can't go wrong. The whole world is behind you. Looking out at the black and white faces in the audience, she added salt and pepper, just what it should be.

Later Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his famous, I have a dream speech. Sounds familiar, I've heard of it. After the event, Josephine Beams, until the march on Washington, I always had this little feeling on my stomach. I was always afraid. I couldn't meet white American people. I didn't want to be around them. But now that little nine feeling is gone.

For the first time in my life, I feel free. I know that everything is right now. Meanwhile, the mayor of St. Louis responds with, pfff, phone, wher, f**king dumb. Pfff, f**king dumb. Pfff, dumb, dumb, dumb. Josephine's performance is a carnage haul where a huge success,

as were her other performances on our American tour in 1963. She then returns to France, immediately starts performing in Paris to try and raise money to keep that chateau. Creditors threatened to sell it. The electricity gas and water cut off in July of 64 that forces the closing of the hotel in restaurant, making things worse.

And then in 1968, she loses it for good. When the new owners of the shout out, we're about to move in this virus, though, sad. Josephine barricades herself in the kitchen. Tries to lock herself in. She's bawling, she doesn't want to leave. Eight men have to come in and physically haul her out. Like she fights them.

They have to pick up this devastated 60-chirilled champion by her arms and legs and a bang in her head on the stove on the way out. Literally have to toss her outside barefoot in a dressing gown and plastic shower cap. Then she just sat there on the front steps weeping until she collapsed and an ambulance was called to take her to the hospital. She had a total breakdown. She lost the chateau. Josephine and children moved into a cramped two-room apartment in Paris, lenta her by a friend. And then she just cried a lot, you know, feeling sorry for herself and talking about how life wasn't fair and about how fucked up it was that, you know, she was practically back where

she started and crammed a little space with a bunch of family members. And she went to bed with a knife and she'd say if anyone, you know, touched her face with her feet, she'd fucking cut him. And she called dibs infinity on future baths. She always got to go first, and she never did anything else. Cool again. She just gave up. Now of course she didn't do that. She was a champion. She fell apart for two weeks.

She allowed herself to collapse for two weeks, and then she started doing shows again. She lined up tons of shows, continued to perform in countries all over the world to take care of those rainbow kids. 1974, Josephine returned to Carnegie Hall and fucking kicked ass. Alright, if you're formed and singled songs including Dylan's The Times, they are a change in she ended with Myway shouting, I did it Myway because I so profoundly believe in humanity. Josephine's performances were met with standing ovations and critical acclaim.

She's for sure conquered America now. 1975 she returned to the pre-eation stage to perform in a review entitled Josephine, a show about her life, a show celebrating the 50th anniversary of her Paris debut and included her childhood in St. Louis, showing her arrival in Paris for La Negra review, the banana dance of the follies, her war service, her life at the chattel with the rainbow tribe. Josephine was on stage for the entire show to tell the story even though younger dancers depicted her earlier years. And on the first night of her performance, many of her old celebrity friends were in the audience,

including royalty, other noted performers like Mick Jagger from the Rolling Stones. There was a huge party after that first night for 250 celebrities in the audience, at the Bristol Hotel and Josephine was delirious with excitement and happiness the next night after the performance after dinner she climbed to the top of a table and delightfully chanted, I'm 17, I'm 17. She tried to persuade the rest of her party to accompany her to some cabaret and you

know, continue partying after they were done at this establishment and when no one else would keep going with her, the 68 year old woman told them, on the youngest of you all. And then the next day, her assistant, Anisa Papitos, couldn't wake her up when it was time to go to the theater. Josephine was taken by ambulance to a hospital and her assistant called her sister, Willie May, who was now living with her. Her sister came immediately, held her hand, calling her tummy. She had suffered a cerebral hemorrhage during her sleep and she would never again gain consciousness.

Josephine Baker passed away in the early morning hours of April 12, 1975. She went out in style. And on April 15, thousands of parisians line the streets as the hearse carrying her body wound its way through the French city. Over 20,000 people crowded the streets outside the church, La Ingles, Madeline, where her services were held, countless others watched her funeral on national French television as a decorated war hero. Her casket was draped with the French flag. She was given a 21 gun salute, even in death.

Josephine had provided a final performance for her audience, and that takes us out of this epic, inspiring time-soaked timeline. Good job, soldier. You've made it back. Barely. I mean, what a life. The young black girl from St. Louis who slept in a cellar with a dog when she was an eight-year-old maid. The girl who'd witnessed those 1917 race riots firsthand.

The girl who'd been divorced twice by the age of 15. The girl who wore high heel shoes with the heels broken off to school with the same outfit for a whole year to be mocked by her classmates. That girl, that girl grew up to live like a queen as the most famous woman in the fucking world, definitely in France. She counted princes and princesses among her admirers. She became a warrior and a civil war champion. Grade A plus top shelf meat sack. I hope you took some inspiration from this story. Think about how many times you could quit along her journey. How many times could she

just said, fuck it, it's too hard. Just giving up like her stepdad did or just ran away from responsibility like her dad did. Think about how much she loved that shouts hell home for her rainbow children yet still gave to charities And she tries raise money to keep it think about how brave she was to go and perform in countries where legislators called her Indicent were actual nazi screamed at her as she was on stage Think of the courage he showed arresting that man in California refusing to play that club in Florida until they let her perform in front of a black crowd She was so many things. Mostly she was just fucking amazing. And I'm glad I got to spend a lot of time with her this past weekend, with her story and

her spirit. I hope you are too. Fight for your dreams. Fight for what you think is right, means, sax, forever. Fight like she did until the fucking day you die. Why not? What's the alternative? Just to get old, slowly fade out, not doing shit. Who wants that? Where's the fun in that? Time now for top five

takeaways. Time suck. Top five takeaways. Number one, Josephine was the world's first international famous black female superstar. And also, I forgot to mention this, the first black woman to ever star in emotion picture. Number two, Josephine became a spy and successfully smuggled intelligence in and out of enemy territory for the French resistance against the Nazis in World War II. Number three, Josephine Baker rose from being one of the poorest kids in St. Louis, which he was born in 1906 to being the most famous woman in France and a sex symbol internationally by 1925 Number four Joe Steve would never give birth to a child of her own, but she would adopt 12 children from all over the globe her rainbow tribe to prove that we really

Can't all get along Also becoming one of the leading voices and one of the bravest voices in the American civil rights movement How much is how much did she change because of her life? Number five, new info. Josephine was very likely bisexual. She's bustin' out all kinds of norms. According to her biography and son, Jean-Claude Baker and several other biographers, it's likely that Josephine Baker had a fairs with numerous women. Clara Smith, that successful blue singer who first took her under her wing, Milnerid Smallwood, the first African American woman to appear in American Dance magazine,

Bestie Buchanan, the first American African American woman to have a seat in New York State legislator. Those are just some of her alleged lovers and there were many others. And with all the prejudice she faced, she just chose to live the life she wanted to live over and over again. Hail Lucifina, Hail Josephine Baker. Time suck, top five takeaway. Josephine Baker sucked.

That's a hot sentence to say. One lady woulda meet Sack thanks to the time suck team. Thanks to Queen of the Suck, my sexist lady, sexist lady in the world for me, Lindsey Cummins, high priest of the Suck Harmony Belly Camp, Reverend Dr. Joe horsecock Johnson pays Lee former horse jockey Thanks to the Benelixer app design crew the new update update is here. I don't know that makes me last so hard It's so good. I hope you check out this new app

thanks also to access a parallel script keepers act flannery and Let's talk about next week What if you could go back in time change something you said or did in your past? What if you could go back and kill baby Hiller or probably better, just raising better? Give my hot Jewish nanny. What if you could jump to the future and see how this whole humanity thing is going to work out? Well, you can't not even close.

But on the next episode of TimeStuck, we are going to check out the vast topic of time travel. To learn about what exactly is holding us back from around space and time. And we'll look at both the science of time travel, the mythology and science fiction that jumpstarted the concept and drives the research of today. Well, also, this is going to be fun. Meet some of the wackiest wacky noodles in all the wacky doodle world. As we profile several strange folks who have some time travel stories to tell.

Also does the US government have secret time travel programs? Maybe, maybe not. I bet there's some fun people who think so though. We'll do our best to flesh out the truth from the mountains of space, time, bullshit. We'll also meet some of the world's best thinkers and digest their thoughts on the reality of time travel. The episode will touch on everything from physics and engineering to hoverboards and psychic powers. Nearly every culture is dabbled with the concept of traveling through time. How close are we to pulling this off? Tune in next week as we suck time itself here on TimeSuck and TimeNow for today's updates to previous messages or just some fine folks who have sent us some entertaining messages. And thank you all for taking the time to send these into the show TimeNow for TimeSucker

updates. Updates, get your time sucker updates. Okay, first update is from new listener, Bonnie L who just got got Bonnie writes, hey there, new listener here, we're listening to the podcast, for only a few months has a variety in this. Now usually I'm pretty good at picking out the lies, you love to sprinkle in all over the podcast, but in the Jambane Ramsey suck, you made me damn near nauseous

with your little Miss Hustler lie. We got a lot of these emails. I was listening to the episode on Jambanay at work when you started describing this horrifying monstrosity of a fake child pageant. The whole time I just sat there working on Excel spreadsheets with this look of pure, unadulterated disgust on my face in an open office in front of my coworkers. I was just about ready to dry. He's at my desk. When you drop the line, uh, www dot get the fuck out of here. Uh, at that point, I just shook my head and shame, knowing full well that you got me seems like a dumb thing to fall for. But instead of we live in a world where patents sign their kids up, uh, or parents sign their kids up for child beauty patents and even dance teams for dancers were a super skimpy outfits and perform borderline

suggestive jazz dance moves. I wouldn't exactly put something like that LMH almost hosed their hoedown out of the realm of possibilities. It's probably a good thing that everyone in the office was so focused on work and no one really noticed me working on Excel spreadsheets with a look of sheer horror and discuss them at face. I know you get a lot of messages like this where listener falls from one of your obvious lies, but I wanted to share my story because I mentioned earlier, I don't usually fall for

them, but here we are. Any who really love listening to podcasts, keep on sucking. Bonnie L. Love it, Bonnie. I love getting the, I'll never get tired of getting those messages to make me so happy. I'm glad you're enjoying the show. And I'm glad that's not real. Great new vaccination perspective update from Mikey Jones, fine time, sugar, who writes. Good morning, Dan. I recently listened to your podcast on the anti-vaccine movement. I have to start off by saying, I am not an anti-vaccine proponent, but rather a vaccine reform proponent.

There are a few things to when I mentioned in the podcast. One, the special court system for damage is done by vaccines. Two, the heavy metals and vaccines that passed the blood brain barrier. Three, the potentially deadly side effects from vaccines, specifically the flu vaccine. Should I get the flu and recover in a week or get a vaccine that could possibly give me the flu anyway? Four, the ingredients such as fetal tissue and the recent ban toxic substances like mercury, I strongly believe people like myself who want vaccine reform are thrown into a category of being 100% completely anti-vaccine. That is nonsense.

I don't believe vaccines cause autism because there is no science to support that. However, I do believe that giving so many vaccines at once to a child with a weak immune system might not be safe. And there are medical professionals who agree with that. Vaccine reform is not anti-vaccine. Thank you, Mike. Yes, great points. Vaccine reform. Not not anti-vaccine. Thank you, Mike. Yes, great points. Vaccine reform, not an anti-vaccine belief. And I do think, yeah, of course, vaccine should be reformed,

as it should be all medicine. Medicine should be continually reformed and just designed to become safer and safer with less side effects. That just be a goal for medicine in general. So, yeah, that's an important group to bring up vaccine reformers. Not against it. Just think that, yeah, maybe we can, you know, we should just keep our eye on these things and keep tweaking it and make it better and safer. So thank you for sending that in. Time sucker, Jerry, Jerry Lynn made me laugh so hard when I first read this next update.

Jerry Lynn writes, damn you, Dan, I was just listening to the Ramsey suck and I was picking up my 13 year old from school. Usually I mute it at the school. So I push play right after my son gets into the car. It's a sunny day up here in Alaska and the windows were down. I press play just at the part where you start talking about little girls taking off their shirts

and my 13 year old boy yells, what the actual fuck? My first response should have been to Yale. However, my eyes went wide and I slowly turned him towards him slowly laughing way too hard. I guarantee people heard. I don't think I'm going to want to be seen in any PTA meetings in the near future. Anyway, keep doing what you're doing. And again, get your ass up here to Alaska to your own mask. Oh, thank you for sending that in. That does crack down. I would love to get to Alaska. Hopefully one of these days, love to get up here to Alaska to your own massacre. Oh, thank you for sending that in. That does crack me out. I would love to get up to Alaska. Hopefully, one of these days, I'd love to get up back to Anchorage.

And Juno's, Juno Anchorage Fairbanks, all good. Hopefully I can do a little run in Alaska one of these days. Not opposed to it. Time Sucker, Aaron Fink has our first special shout out request for today. Aaron writes, good afternoon, Suck Master. I'd message you about a fellow Suck and friend of mine who actually introduced me

to Time Sucker a few years ago. His name is Eric Wallace. He's from Catskill, New York. He passed away in the 16th as a result of a head on traffic collision. He was 29 years old, one of your biggest fans. Fucking awesome guy all around on my best friends. I know he's made it to the great sack of Nimrod. I just wanted to know if you could give him a shout out, I know he would love that.

Thanks, Dan, everyone at Time Sucker. Aaron, yes, Eric Wallace. Thank you for being a time, sucker, man. Sorry, you're no longer with us and hope you are enjoying where you're out now or where you are at now. And yes, sorry you were taken so suddenly and soon and so young, man. And we got a similar thing here.

Well, this last one, finally, yeah, definitely some sad news. Spaceless or Brian Cox, uh, talk about a fall in future lizard, who, for whatever, whatever reason, I, I think is going to hear this shout out, just like I'm hoping Eric Wallace is here in this or heard his little shout out. Uh, okay. So Brian writes, dear Dan, I wanted to write a couple of things first before this shit gets fucked up. First of all, I'm big fan of your standup, senior and Sacramento, where I gave you a

medal, ESWS that I earned while serving in the Navy. Man, thank you. It is a big deal and a crazy time of my life. And so are you, which is why I seem necessary that you should have it. Man, that's, I am honored. We also met at Fruits to see feathers and you were happy and was happy to see you again. I've been a long time list and of course, I've been a space lizard ever since its inception. You had an amazing knack to touch me right into my soul space and have cheered me up over the years.

I wasn't sure if I was going to reach out as I'm playing sugar you get a ton of these kind of messages along with an ass load of shit, shit you have to do yesterday. Well, yeah we are busy. But I can't say I've ever done anything on my power to help my family unless I try. So here goes, the part to get shitty. On September 7th, my 14 year old nephew was collecting bait near a bridge in Jacksonville, Florida when something was needed in the car parked across the street. So Joey, my nephew was waiting on the shoulder,

waiting for a car to pass when the car swerved and hit him. The woman had been speeding and he had no time to react or get out of the way. He was knocked out and as soon as his stepdad saw what had happened began CPR on him It was at that point both of his lungs had collapsed He died on the scene before the ambulance could get to him The driver was not breathalyzed or given any kind of drug test was free to go of course the media showed up And did a report broadcast that he ran out into the road like he was a moron and continued to cover the story around how speeding is a problem The impact damage was on the front right corner of her car on expert, but it sounds like she was messed up on her phone, not paying attention to both.

This is broken my family. Everyone is doing the best they can. I put his fundraiser on the Facebook page. Thank you. So yeah, and I'm grateful as hell that people have already donated. I was wondering if maybe you can give him a shout out as I know, once I got him into the podcast, he would have been a space lizard.

There is no doubt in my mind as he could often be heard saying, prove it when someone told him something. He was incredibly smart. And aptitude test told us that he was thinking at a sophomore and college level. Anyways, I know this is long and it's sad. We miss him dearly.

His name was Joseph Lawrence Cox. May he rest in peace. Well, you know what? You would have been a great space as are Joseph Lawrence Cox. I hope you know what? You would have been in great spaces. They're Joseph Lawrence Cox. I hope you're happy. Still curious wherever you are. Because what phone would it be to have all the answers?

I'm sorry, he left this world so, so soon. I hope this next world treats you better. Thank you for your service, Brian. You're a good uncle. I hope this all helps somehow. Thank you all for all your messages and and rest in peace to both Joseph Lawrence Cox and also Eric Wallace

Quick moment of silence for them both. Thank you for your messages Thanks time suckers. I need a net. We all did Have a great week everybody be careful stay safe if you have to use the same bathwater as everyone else in your family try not to be last and keep on sucking That's when you come on over bring that hot apple side I'll bring your peanut butter That's when you come on over, bring that hot apple cider, bring your peanut butter showbiz boom boom!