Haskell Library, Vermont

The Haskell Library and Opera House, in Derby Line, was intentionally built on the international boundary by its benefactors in 1904, to celebrate the friendship between the two countries. The line goes through the building obliquely, though the main entrance is on the US side. Many redundancies and building code complexities have to be tolerated by the building managers. For example, two separate fire escapes had to be built, one in the US, and one for Canada. After repairing the roof a few years ago, the building’s owners were sued for not hiring a Canadian contractor to work on the Canadian portion of the roof. Inside the library the line has been painted on the floor, indicating the boundary passing through the lobby, the reading room (where it bisects a shelf of encyclopedias), and through the theater upstairs, where the stage is in Canada, and much of the audience sits in the USA. Across the street from the library, a small apartment building is divided by the line. Most tenants use the door on the US side to go both in and out, to avoid problems with border patrol, usually parked outside. There are three other small apartment buildings nearby split by the line, as well as one private home, and a factory, making a total of seven occupied structures, divided by the line, more than in any other community on the US/Canada border.