By Liz Holland

Wicomico Public Libraries will have a new Executive Director, nine months after its former leader departed to work in a regional library system.

Seth Hershberger, who has held positions in the U.S. and in two foreign countries, will start his new job on July 19, the library’s Board of Trustees announced last week.

Hershberger holds a master’s degree in Library and Information Science from the University of Missouri.

He joined the Peace Corps in 2004, and during his two years of service, he established two primary school libraries in Pacific island villages in the country of Tonga.

After returning to the United States, Hershberger became the Assistant Director/Head of Public Services at Cass County Public Library in Missouri for 10 years.

He then ventured overseas again, this time to Guyana in South America. There, he worked in the U.S. Embassy as a Public Diplomacy Professional Associate and Community Liaison Officer with the U. S. State Department.

“Thank you for agreeing to place your trust in me to lead Wicomico Library into the future,” Hershberger told the Wicomico Library Board of Trustees. “I am both humbled and excited. I’m eager to begin.”

He will be coming to Wicomico County from Bethesda, Md.

Hershberger will replace Ashley Teagle, who resigned last October after less than two years on the job because of what she said was interference by certain County Council members who, at times, resorted to intimidation and bullying.

“I just feel like the county government needs to get out of the way and let the library director run the library along with the Board of Trustees,” Ashley Teagle told council members during their Oct. 6 meeting.

Teagle also said the county needs to begin investing more in the library, which is one of the lowest funded in Maryland.