Josephine Baker honoured after 46 years of her death

Paris: Josephine Baker overcame the racism that she parodied in her famous banana skirt dance to become the world´s first Black female superstar.

And later this month she will become the first Black woman to enter the Pantheon in Paris, the mausoleum reserved for France´s "great men".

Her adopted country is honouring her 46 years after her death not only as a mould-breaking entertainer but also as a French Resistance hero, civil rights activist and a diversity pioneer who created her own multiracial family.

Born Freda Josephine McDonald into extreme poverty in Missouri in 1906, Baker left school at 13.

After two failed marriages -- she took the name Baker from her second husband -- she managed to land herself a place in one of the first all-Black musicals on Broadway in 1921.

Like many Black American artists at the time, she moved to France to escape racist discrimination back home.

But she never stopped campaigning for civil rights.

- March on Washington -

She was the only woman to address the March on Washington in 1963, taking the microphone after Martin Luther King had given his iconic "I have a dream" speech.

In a personal bid to prove there is "only one race", Baker adopted 12 children from across the world to live with her in her French chateau, which she later tried to turn into a "Global Village".

"We all have the same heart, the same blood, and the same need for love," she declared.

Baker became a fashion idol, deluged with dresses by designers, and kept control of her image by working with illustrator Paul Colin, who created some of the most enduring images of her.

Her 1931 hit song "Two Loves" made her a diva, a reputation further boosted by her lead role as the Tunisian singer in the 1935 movie "Princess Tam Tam".

Such was her star power that the movie later gave its name to a luxury French lingerie brand.

"If I want to become a star, I have to be scandalous," Baker declared.

The woman known as "Black Venus" would also perform with a snake wrapped around her neck or with her pet cheetah.

She died on April 12, 1975, aged 68, from a brain haemorrhage as she read the reviews of the star-studded gala attended by Mick Jagger and Sophia Loren to celebrate her half-century on the stage.