page_title: Haskell Free Library and Opera House
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Haskell Free Library and Opera House / History
caption_attribution_description: English: International border runs through the Haskell Free Library and Opera House, Derby Line VT/Stanstead QC. This is an image of a place or building that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places in the United States of America. Its reference number is 76000143
context_page_description: The Haskell Free Library and Opera House is a Victorian building that straddles the international border in Rock Island, Quebec and Derby Line, Vermont. The Opera House opened on June 7, 1904, and was deliberately built on the border between Canada and the United States. 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, Stanstead, Quebec.
context_section_description: The Haskell Free Library and Opera House was a gift from Mrs. Martha Stewart Haskell and her son Col. 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 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 4 other scenes 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 2-foot-thick (0.61 m) walls built of granite from Stanstead.
  The Haskell family later donated the building to the towns of Derby Line and Rock Island in Mr. Haskell's memory; it is run by a private international board of four American and three Canadian directors.
caption: The international boundary is marked as a black line on the floor of the reading room of the Haskell Library. In this picture, Canada is on the right side of the line and the United States is on the left.
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