CANUSA

Different speed limits, maybe?

We had a Canadian guest to dinner yesterday evening and she told us all about her fascinating hometown of Stanstead, Quebec. The Tomifobia River runs through the town, at times delineating the U.S./Canadian border. Along portions of Canada’s Rue Canusa, houses on the southern end of the street lay entirely within Vermont, while their driveways direct northward, and connect to the street in Quebec, as the northern portions of their properties are within Canada. These residents’ backyard neighbours are American, while families living right across the street are Canadian, though no noticeable boundary exists between the two (the street itself is entirely within Canada). In other places, the international border runs through individual homes, so that meals prepared in one country are eaten in the other. An entire tool-and-die factory, once operated by the Butterfield division of Litton Industries, is also divided in two by the border. Nearby Rock Island is known for the Haskell Free Library and Opera House, opened in 1904 and deliberately constructed on the international border. The original owners were a couple with dual nationality; Mr. Carlos F. Haskell was an American businessman from Derby Line who owned a number of sawmills, while Mrs. Haskell was born in Canada. The intent was that people on both sides of the border would have use of the facility, which is now a designated historic site. All over Stanstead and Rock Island there are lines to indicate where the frontier goes (I found a picture of a road). Now, closer to home, I know about the road which is half in Luxembourg (and therefore full of petrol pumps) and half in Belgium, but do we Europeans have anything quite like the Haskell Free Library and Opera House?