Joséphine Baker (1906-1975) received France’s highest posthumous civil honor when she was inducted into the Pantheon in Paris on November 30, 2021.
The Missouri-born entertainer, resistance fighter and civil rights activist arrived in Paris in 1925 and soon found fame in France and internationally. She became a naturalized French citizen in 1937, losing her American citizenship in the process (while also gaining an accent on the e in her first name).
The Pantheon, a major monument of the 18th-century, was built as a church then came to serve as the secular tomb of the great men and, more recently, women of France.
The first Black woman and first U.S.-born individual to be “Pantheonized,” Josephine Baker joins statesmen, scientists, authors, resistance leaders, economists, architects, generals, philosophers and others who, at the time of their induction, were held to represent exemplary values of France. Since 1958, individuals have been selected for Pantheonization by decision of the president.
While Baker’s remains are buried in Monaco, her presence in the Pantheon is marked by a cenotaph bearing her name and containing soil from places where she lived: the United States, France, Monaco).
Follow the steps to Joséphine Baker’s cenotaph in vault 13 of the crypt of the Pantheon in this video:
Video and text by Gary Lee Kraut. © 2021. All rights reserved.
Music: Opening of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue performed by George Gershwin and Paul Whiteman. Creative Commons.