Back in England, one of the British soldiers that continue to return in their thousands from Northern France, belies any mood of defeat with some high spirited piping on a train. (Photo by Parker/Fox Photos/Getty Images). 1st June 1940

Frenchman Georges Speicher drinks as he starts riding down the Col de l'Aubisque during the 18th stage of the Tour de France between Tarbes and Pau. on July 17, 1933. Speicher finished second beaten by Spanish winner Learco Guerra to retain his overall leader's yellox jersey on his way to winning the Tour de France. (Photo by France Presse Voir/AFP Photo)

A reveler dances during the Carmelitas street party in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Friday, March 1, 2019. Much of the appeal of Rio street parties is the variety of themes and that people can dress up in costumes or not. (Photo by Leo Correa/AP Photo)

“Josephine Baker (June 3, 1906 – April 12, 1975) was an American-born French dancer, singer, and actress. Nicknamed the “Bronze Venus”, the “Black Pearl”, and even the “Créole Goddess” in anglophone nations.

Baker was the first African American female to star in a major motion picture and to integrate an American concert hall, and to become a world-famous entertainer. She is also noted for her contributions to the Civil Rights Movement in the United States (she was offered the unofficial leadership of the movement by Coretta Scott King in 1968 following Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination, but turned it down), for assisting the French Resistance during World War II and for being the first American-born woman to receive the French military honor, the Croix de guerre”.

Photo: American entertainer Josephine Baker in costume for her famous “banana dance”. Baker was an overnight sensation when she arrived in Paris in the mid-1920s. (Photo by Walery/Getty Images)

A man stands between thousands of paper lanterns, which were displayed and lit up the precincts of the shrine, where more than 2.4 million war-dead are enshrined, during the Mitama Festival at Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo, Japan July 13, 2016. “Mitama” is a respectful word that means “the soul of a dead person” in Japanese, and this “Soul Festival” honors just that. (Photo by Issei Kato/Reuters)

A Russian-made rifle, carried by this woman when she was captured in Nearby Brush, is slung around her neck by South Vietnamese soldiers before they began their interrogation of her as Viet Cong suspect near AP La Ghi in Vietnam, August 25, 1965. The girl behind the woman, also was captured in the brush. (Photo by AP Photo)

Burdened with a shawl full of her belongings, a woman stops for a rest on the road between Julaca and Puno in Peru. (Photo by Three Lions/Getty Images). Circa 1955

An armoured vehicle surrounded by Chicago cops at the time of the American depression, 1933. (Photo by Rolls Press/Popperfoto/Getty Images)