In our Detroit News Wednesday is an article about tour highlights love affair of blacks in Paris..

It goes on like this.....

Any
American with even a slight familiarity with Paris knows about Josephine Baker, the black swivel-hipped cabaret entertainer who shunned racism in America, Vaulted to stardom there in 1925,and stayed on to become one of France's most adored 20th century icons.

But what about William Wells Brown, the 19th century former slave turned abolitionist who once expressed awe that he could pray next to whites at La Madeleine church, or that some tipped their hat to him on Paris streets.

I love reading this article. It made me fall in love with Paris even more. And I am hoping to get the chance to take the tour in March.

Here's the web

www.blackparistour.com for more info.

Have a wonderful day Fodorite's

Theresa in Cold as a the north pole Detroit.

Mamaw, That article depicts the attitude of most Europeans prior to WWII; much much more enlightened than the racial attitudes of the day in the U.S. Sad thing is that now with an immigration tidal wave in France of people from the Middle East, and failed assimilation programs; there has been the unrest/riots in the Muslim suburbs of Paris.

Hi Mamaw ... We had a thread on here recently about "Touring Black Paris". I think I linked to the same article when it was published in the Toronto Globe and Mail a week or two ago.

Here's the previous thread, with a link to the Globe:

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35102805

Anselm

I was under the impression that this goodwill was extended to American Blacks, not French.

>I was under the impression that this goodwill was extended to American Blacks, not French.

"'tis true: 'tis true 'tis pity; And pity 'tis 'tis true".

American Negroes were exotic. Dark-skinned people from anywhere in the Colonial Empire weren't.

Sidney Bechet, Josephine Baker, James Baldwin, etc., were not exactly your average worker, either. They were celebrities, artists, etc.

no offense christine

but I don't believe anyone you listed didn't work in the average or worse way before heading to Europe. I can't even begin to say I know how it must have been for Blacks in America during slavery and the 20 years after it was abolished. And in some area's of the world Slavery still exsists.