The Martha’s Vineyard Museum announced this week that executive director Keith Gorman has resigned.

Mr. Gorman, who took over as executive director in January 2008, will stay in his post through the end of the summer, a press release said.

“I will be forever appreciative of the opportunity to lead this organization and to work with such dedicated colleagues,” Mr. Gorman said in the press statement.

Mr. Gorman came to the museum as its first professionally trained archivist in June of 2005.

Since coming to work at the museum, he has divided his time between the Vineyard and North Carolina, where his wife is working toward a doctoral degree at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

“My desire to be with my wife and start a family in North Carolina ultimately led me to this difficult decision,” Mr. Gorman said in his resignation letter.

A search committee has been formed to begin the process of finding a replacement for Mr. Gorman.

Beset by financial problems in the past few years, the museum has struggled to get a capital campaign off the ground. The campaign is aimed at relocating the museum from its campus in the heart of downtown Edgartown to property it owns abutting the Polly Hill Arboretum in West Tisbury.