Myra Vandersall Siegenthaler of Newton Center, died Oct. 4 at Wayside Hospice in Wayland. She was 84 years old.

Mrs. Siegenthaler was born in Cairo, Egypt, on Oct. 18, 1926, the daughter of Herbert and Neva Vandersall and sister of the late Lloyd Vandersall, and raised on the campus of the American University in Cairo where her father was head of the Science Department. She attended the Schutz American School in Alexandria, Egypt, and Hyde Park High School in Chicago, Ill., before graduating from Wooster College with a degree in English. After teaching in Egypt and studying in Italy, she earned her Master’s degree in English from Bryn Mawr College in 1952.

Upon graduation, she married the Reverend David Siegenthaler and moved to Bangor, Maine, where they started their family of four sons. Following a move to Massachusetts and many years in Duxbury, where her husband was the Rector of St. John’s Episcopal Church, the family moved to Newton Center. Mrs. Siegenthaler returned to graduate school earning a Master of Library Science at Simmons College and began a 16 year career that concluded as Deputy Director of the main library at Tufts University.  She later served as head librarian at the Boston University School of Theology for eight years. She served for many years on the board of the Association of College and Research Libraries and one as President of ACRL/New England.  She was a longtime member at the Church of the Redeemer in Chestnut Hill, particularly of the Altar Guild.  She was a member for ten years of the Harvard Institute for Learning in Retirement (HILR), participating in courses and volunteering in support of the library.

Mrs. Siegenthaler leaves her former husband, David of Cambridge; her four sons, John and his wife Betty of Millbrook, N.Y., Mark and his wife Diana of Bedford, Paul and his wife Sherri Stucker of Needham, and Peter and his former wife Karin Wilkins of Austin, Texas; and nine grandchildren.

A memorial service will be scheduled at the Church of the Redeemer in Chestnut Hill.  Private burial will be at St. John the Evangelist in Duxbury.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be sent to Wayside Hospice in Wayland, or to the Church of the Redeemer in Chestnut Hill, in her memory.