The Haskell Free Library and Opera House () is a Victorian building that straddles the Canada–United States border, in Rock Island (now part of Stanstead), Quebec, and Derby Line, Vermont, respectively. The Opera House opened on June 7, 1904, having deliberately been built on the international border. It was declared a heritage building by both countries in the 1970s and 1980s.

The library has two different addresses and postal codes: 93 Caswell Avenue, Derby Line, Vermont, 05830 and 1 rue Church (Church Street), Stanstead, Quebec, J0B 3E2.

Overview

The building was designed by architect James Ball in the Queen Anne Revival style. The first floor houses the book collection and reading rooms and a 500-seat theater occupies the second and third floors.

The library collection and the theater stage are located in Stanstead, but the main entrance and most theater seats are located in Derby Line. Because of this, the Haskell is sometimes called "the only opera house in the U.S.A. with no stage.”

There is now an entrance on the Canadian side of the building, which was originally used as an emergency exit prior to 2025. Until 2025, patrons from Canada were permitted to enter the United States door without needing to report to US Customs by using a prescribed route through the sidewalk of rue Church (Church Street), provided that they return to Canada immediately upon leaving the building using the same route. United States officials restricted most Canadians from entering via the main entrance in March 2025, except for Canadian patrons with a library card.

Library

The library, located at ground level, has a collection of more than 20,000 books in English and French and is open to the public five days a week. French and English books are organized separately because of different language conventions in the direction of printing titles on spines: English books have titles written top-to-bottom, and most French books bottom-to-top.

A thick black-tape line runs diagonally across the center of the library to mark the Canada–United States border.

Opera house

The opera house on the second floor was rumored to be modeled after the old Boston Opera House in a somewhat scaled down fashion (it seats four hundred), but the Boston Opera house was built afterwards. A painted scene of Venice on the drop curtain and four other backdrops by Erwin Lamoss (1901) and plaster scrollwork complete with plump cherubs built in Boston ornament the opera hall and balcony in this historic building, which was constructed with walls built of granite from Stanstead.

A thick black line runs beneath the seats of the theater to mark the Canada–United States border.

The Haskell family later donated the building to the towns of Derby Line and Rock Island (now Stanstead) in Haskell's memory; it is run by a private board of four American and three Canadian directors.

The building is recognized as a historic site in both countries. In the United States, it has been registered in the National Register of Historic Places since 1976. In Canada, it has been a provincial heritage site since 1977 and was designated a National Historic Site in 1985.

2010s

After the Trump travel ban in January 2017, the library served as a site for international reunions, as it is partly in Canada and partly in the United States. The play A Distinct Society by Kareem Fahmy is based on the family reunions that used to take place at the library. The entrances are now monitored by both government border agencies, and family reunions and cross-border visits are no longer allowed. Library staff have imposed other security measures and give U.S. and Canadian officials advance notice of large gatherings. Until then, the only Canadians who could access the library via the main entrance were library membership cardholders and staff. US officials cited security concerns as a reason for the change, though there had been very few security or smuggling issues.

The Haskell launched a fundraiser for a permanent, accessible entrance on the Canadian side, with author Louise Penny making a major donation; the library initially planned to raise CA$100,000 but was able to raise CA$170,000 within a week.

The new entrance opened in April 2026. The ribbon-cutting is planned for June 2026. The final cost climbed to nearly $700,000 against a fundraising target of $350,000. Attempts to complete the granite work in winter caused a pipe to burst and extensive flood damage had to be repaired. The finished design does not match the aesthetic of the building’s original character, however it meets a Ministère de la Culture et des Communications du Québec (MCCQ), the province’s heritage authority regulation for contemporary appearance.

In March 2026 a joint U.S. and Canadian protest occurred outside the building with protesters holding signs criticizing United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the escalation of the Middle Eastern crisis.

See also

  • Line house, a building that straddles an international boundary.
  • Baarle-Nassau and Baarle-Hertog, two communities with a complicated borderline between The Netherlands and Belgium.
  • Collins–Valentine line, the boundary between Quebec and the states of Vermont and New York, surveyed in the early 1770s.
  • Estcourt Station, Maine (population 4) and Pohénégamook, Quebec
  • La Cure, a village divided between Switzerland and France; Hotel Arbez is bisected by the boundary, as are at least two residences and a pub.
  • Paul VI Audience Hall, located partially in the Vatican City, but mostly in Rome, Italy: the Italian part of the building is treated as an extraterritorial area of the Holy See and is used by the Pope as an alternative to Saint Peter's Square when conducting his Wednesday morning General Audience.
  • List of historic places in Estrie
  • List of National Historic Sites of Canada in Quebec
  • National Register of Historic Places listings in Orleans County, Vermont
  • Transnational marriage

References

  • Visiting procedures on its official web site