Jeri Sullivan

American singer and songwriter. Birth name: Leona Louise Schlosser.

Born November 14, 1918 in Jersey City, Hudson, New jersey, USA.

Died June 276, 2003 in Palm Desert, Riverside, California, USA.

She was known mostly as a nightclub singer and sang with many orchestras including those of Bernie Cummins, Orrin Tucker, Johnny White, Lou Bring, Bernie Leighton's Swing Four and Freddie Shumake and his band. She also sang with The Mel-Tones (who changed their name after she left to "Mel Torme and The Mel-Tones"). Sullivan also dubbed singing voices in movies, including for Virginia Mayo in "A Song Is Born" (also known as "That's Life") (1948).

Though she wrote other songs, she is mostly known for a song she helped edit but was given full co-writing credit for: "Rum and Coca Cola". After the song hit #1 by The Andrew Sisters, lawsuits followed. These went on until it was settled in 1948-9, allowing her to keep copyright but she, [a=Morey Amsterdam] and [a=Paul Baron] had to pay $150,000 to the original lyricist and composer of the song in Trinidad. After taking time to settle the lawsuits, she returned to singing on the nightclub circuit.