LaVern Baker was the second female solo artist ever inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, behind only Aretha Franklin, yet a few years later she was buried in an unmarked grave. This episode traces the Chicago-born singer who debuted as Little Miss Sharecropper in the post-war club scene, cycled through the names Bea Baker and Dolores Baker, and finally broke through at Atlantic Records with the million-selling "Tweedlee Dee" in 1955, followed by "Jim Dandy," "I Cried a Tear," and "Saved."

We dig into Georgia Gibbs' note-for-note cover of "Tweedlee Dee," which went to number one on the pop chart, the 1950s copyright loophole that protected sheet music but not the sound of a recording, and how Baker sued for a quarter of a million dollars and then petitioned Congress, spurring Michigan Congressman Charles Diggs to investigate song th ...