, image = HaskellFreeLibraryandOperaHouse.JPG , caption = Haskell Free Library and Opera House in 2012 , location =

Stanstead, Quebec Stanstead is a town in the Memphrémagog Regional County Municipality in the Estrie region of Quebec, located on the Canada–United States border across from Derby Line, Vermont. The Town of Stanstead was created in 1995 by the merger of t ...

, Canada

Derby Line, Vermont Derby Line is an incorporated village in the town of Derby in Orleans County, Vermont, United States, slightly north of the 45th parallel, the nominal U.S.-Canada boundary. The population was 687 at the 2020 census. The village is located o ...

, U.S. , coordinates = , area = , architect = Nate Beach & James Ball , architecture =

Romanesque Revival Romanesque Revival (or Neo-Romanesque) is a style of building employed beginning in the mid-19th century inspired by the 11th- and 12th-century Romanesque architecture. Unlike the historic Romanesque style, Romanesque Revival buildings tended to ...

, Victorian, Queen Anne Revival , built = 1904–1905 , governing_body = , designation1 = NHSC , designation1_offname =Haskell Free Library and Opera House National Historic Site of Canada , designation1_date = 15 November 1985 , designation2 = NRHP , designation2_offname = , designation2_date = 8 September 1976 , designation2_number = 76000143 , designation3 = Quebec , designation3_offname = Édifice Haskell Free Library and Opera House , designation3_type = Classified heritage immovable , designation3_date = 22 December 1977 , designation3_number = 93138 The Haskell Free Library and Opera House (french: Bibliothèque et salle d'opéra Haskell) is a Victorian building that straddles the

Canada–United States border The border between Canada and the United States is the longest international border in the world. The terrestrial boundary (including boundaries in the Great Lakes, Atlantic, and Pacific coasts) is long. The land border has two sections: ...

, in Rock Island (now part of Stanstead),

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirte ...

and Derby Line,

Vermont Vermont () is a U.S. state, state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York (state), New York to the west, and the Provin ...

, 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: ''93 Caswell Avenue, Derby Line, Vermont'', and ''1 rue Church'' (Church Street), ''Stanstead, Quebec.''

Overview

The

library A library is a collection of materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a physical location or a vi ...

collection and the

opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libr ...

stage are located in Stanstead, but the main entrance and most opera seats are located in Derby Line. Because of this, the Haskell is sometimes called "the only library in the U.S.A. with no books" and "the only opera house in the U.S.A. with no stage". There is no entrance from Canada; however, there is an emergency exit on the Canadian side of the building. All patrons and visitors must use the U.S. entrance to access the building. Patrons from Canada are permitted to enter the United States door without needing to report to 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. A thick black line runs beneath the seats of the opera house and diagonally across the center of the library's reading room to mark the

. The stage and half of the seats are in Canada; the remainder of the opera hall is in the US. The building has different postal codes (93 Caswell Avenue, 05830 and 1, rue Church (Church Street), J0B 3E2) and different telephone area codes (+1- 802-873-3022 and +1- 819-876-2471) in its two respective countries. The library has a collection of more than 20,000 books in French and English and is open to the public 38 hours a week. 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 The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

since 1976. In Canada, it was designated a National Historic Site in 1985 and has been a provincial heritage site since 1977. Following the

Trump travel ban The Trump travel ban (labeled the "Muslim ban" by critics) denotes a series of executive actions taken by Donald Trump as President of the United States. On January 20, 2021, newly-inaugurated president Joe Biden issued a proclamation rev ...

, the library served as a site for international reunions, as it is partly in Canada and partly in the United States.

History

The Haskell Free Library and Opera House was a gift from Martha Stewart Haskell and her son Horace "Stewart" Haskell. It was built in memory of her parents Catherine and Horace Stewart and her husband Carlos Freeman Haskell. The Haskells wanted Canadians and Americans to have equal access to the Library and Opera House and so they chose to build on the border. Construction began in 1901 and the Opera House opened in 1904 and the Library in 1905. The opera house on the second floor was rumored to be modeled after the old

Boston Opera House The Boston Opera House, also known as the Citizens Bank Opera House, is a performing arts and esports venue located at 539 Washington St. in Boston, Massachusetts. It was originally built as the B.F. Keith Memorial Theatre, a movie palace in ...

in a somewhat scaled down fashion (it seats four hundred), but the Boston Opera house was built afterwards. A painted scene of

Venice Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...

on the drop curtain and 4 other scenes by Erwin Lamoss (1901) and plaster scrollwork complete with plump

cherubs A cherub (; plural cherubim; he, כְּרוּב ''kərūḇ'', pl. ''kərūḇīm'', likely borrowed from a derived form of akk, 𒅗𒊏𒁍 ''karabu'' "to bless" such as ''karibu'', "one who blesses", a name for the lamassu) is one of the u ...

built in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

ornament the opera hall and balcony in this historic building, which was constructed with walls built of

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies un ...

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

Organization

French and English books are co-filed. Because of different language conventions in the direction of printing titles on spines—American English books have titles written top-to-bottom, and French books bottom-to-top—the language of a book can be immediately determined.

References

External links

* * *
History of the Library on its official web site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Haskell Free Library And Opera House 1904 establishments in Quebec 1904 establishments in Vermont Buildings and structures in Derby, Vermont Buildings and structures in Estrie Canada–United States border Education in Estrie Event venues on the National Register of Historic Places in Vermont Heritage buildings of Quebec Libraries in Quebec Libraries in Vermont Libraries on the National Register of Historic Places in Vermont Music venues completed in 1904 Music venues in Quebec National Historic Sites in Quebec National Register of Historic Places in Orleans County, Vermont Opera houses in Canada Opera houses in Vermont Opera houses on the National Register of Historic Places Public libraries in Vermont Queen Anne architecture in Canada Queen Anne architecture in Vermont Stanstead, Quebec Theatres completed in 1904 Theatres on the National Register of Historic Places in Vermont Tourist attractions in Estrie Vermont culture

Overview

History

Organization

See also

References

External links