About the Author

Lee Goldman Kikel grew up in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh, where she spent many of her early years in her family’s jewelry business, both as a child and an employee.

Lee’s father, Melvin Goldman, a Holocaust survivor, did not talk much about his childhood in Poland, or his family. In the 1970s, he began recording details of his experiences on cassette tapes, which lay dormant until 2015, when Lee found them and finally listened to his testimony. Lee honored his wishes to transcribe his story as a book, published in 2019 as Perseverance: One Holocaust Survivor’s Journey From Poland to America. In April 2023, Pittsburgh’s Prime Stage Theatre debuted a theatrical adaptation of her book, entitled Perseverance, written by playwright L. E. McCullough and generously supported by a National Endowment for the Arts grant.

Lee has shared her family’s story as a way to inspire a larger conversation about the Holocaust and anti-semitism, including as a generations speaker for the Holocaust Center of Pittsburgh. In over five years, her story has reached nearly eight thousand people comprising diverse audiences in the Western Pennsylvania region and globally, including high school students in Johannesburg and the Folsom Prison Book Club, to name a few. These engagements have taught her the importance of sharing Holocaust education and the value in utilizing family history to generate meaningful discussion.

Goldman Kikel is a lifelong Pittsburgh resident, having earned both a BS in psychology and a master’s degree in education from the University of Pittsburgh. She previously worked in the mental health field as a rehabilitation counselor. Lee is an avid traveler, gardener, and muscle car enthusiast. She lives in suburban Pittsburgh with her husband and son, and their two dogs, Emily and Bryce.