Westmoreland native returns from collegiate roles to lead Ligonier Valley Library staff

Lindsay Mattock began a new chapter of her life in mid-January when she took on the role of executive director of the Ligonier Valley Library and returned to her Westmoreland County roots.

A native of Norvelt and a 2000 graduate of Mt. Pleasant Area High School, Mattock spent the past decade teaching future librarians.

At the University of Iowa, she advanced to director of the School of Library and Information Science. In 2022, she moved to East Carolina University in Greenville, N.C., where she was coordinator of the master of library science program.

“I was trying to get a little bit closer to home, but it wasn’t quite close enough,” Mattock said of her stint in Greenville. ”When this opportunity (at Ligonier) came up, I had to jump on it. I was very excited to come back home and be closer to family.”

Mattock is in the process of relocating to Ligonier, where her brother and his family reside and are library patrons.

“Ligonier is just a gorgeous place to be,” she said. “I didn’t realize, after being in the flatlands for so long, how much I missed the mountains.

“I always admired the library building when we’d come up for Fort Ligonier Days.”

Mattock’s post-secondary career at the University of Pittsburgh began with a bachelor’s degree in her first love: film.

She continued at Pitt, earning a master’s in library and information science, focused on archiving and preserving film and media collections.

“I thought I would be a film archivist,” she said. “Then, when I had the opportunity to do my Ph.D., that steered me in the direction of teaching folks to be librarians and archivists, which has been really exciting.”

Mark Hamilton is a member of the Ligonier Valley Library Association board. He said the board considered applicants from multiple states when choosing a new executive director.

“We had six or seven very strong candidates, and Lindsay was clearly the number one candidate,” he said. “She brings such a strong background in library science.”

Chance to return home

In Iowa, Mattock worked with rural public libraries, where the university students could get real-world experience.

She viewed the Ligonier position as an opportunity for returning to Southwestern Pennsylvania and working directly with communities. The Ligonier Valley Library’s service area includes Bolivar, Laurel Mountain and Ligonier boroughs as well as Fairfield, Cook and Ligonier townships.

“Being able to understand the needs of the community becomes a really important part of building the collections and the services that the library offers,” Mattock said.

She said the library has used surveys to gauge the community’s interest in various resources and programs. In addition to dropping a note in a suggestion box at the front desk, patrons can recommend books for the library to purchase using a form under the “borrow” heading on the library website.

Mattock said an update of that site is planned.

An update of the library’s strategic plan and its 2024 annual report should be released soon, according to Mattock.

“We are looking to expand our programming opportunities for all sorts of patrons,” she said.

That includes a plan to schedule game nights.

“We’re going to invite folks to bring in games they have at home and they might need a few extra people to play, or they can use some of the games we have here in the library,” she said.

An upgrade of the library’s phone system and an energy audit also are being considered.

Mattock values the fact that Ligonier Valley is one of 26 locations included in the Westmoreland County Libraries system, which allow card members to borrow items from their pooled collections — including e-books.

“It allows us to work together to build our collections, especially as we move online,” she said. “The (library) directors meet together once a month, and we’re emailing back and forth on a daily basis.”

Mattock said she’s particularly pleased that Ligonier Valley Library has an active teen advisory board of about a dozen young members.

“They help us to understand what they would like to see at the library,” she said, adding, “They’re doing their own fundraising to buy a 3-D printer.”

Mattock also is enthusiastic when it comes to the library’s Pennsylvania Room, a downstairs area where patrons can find an array of historical materials including photos from past decades.

“For someone who loves film and photography, that’s probably the collection I’m most excited about,” she said. “I’m looking for a day where I can go down and just dig through the Pennsylvania Room and get a better sense of, not only what we have here, but a better sense of the history of Ligonier and the surrounding area.

“I have a basic understanding, but there’s so much more history that I’d like to know.”

The room’s popular annual displays of photos tied to a particular historical theme draw upon its own collection as well as submissions from the public.

“There seems to be a deep interest in local history here,” Mattock noted.

An effort has begun to digitize some of the Pennsylvania Room’s resources, beginning with local high school yearbooks dating back to the 1920s.

“I think it will make those collections more accessible and visible and, hopefully, draw more people to using that space,” Mattock said.

Pennsylvania Room archivist Shirley Iscrupe said the scanned images of the yearbooks will be uploaded to the web through the PA Photos and Documents service and ultimately will be available for viewing through the library’s participation in the state’s Power Library portal.

“The yearbooks get looked at every week,” said Iscrupe. “We’ll make an announcement when they’re ready for people to look at online. It will be pretty exciting.”

Elements from the library’s annual photo displays and scrapbooks documenting the history of the library and past community events also may find their way to the online database.

“Libraries and archives are meant to be used,” said Mattock. “Libraries are a great source of information. The more that we can put online, the better the information that’s out there.”