In this border town, a library is trying to preserve a 125-year-old bond between the US and Canada

In this border town of about 700 people, you can’t separate the United States and Canada — regardless of politics.

Driving its streets, two things stand out: a downhill funnel to the US-Canada border checkpoint, and a uniquely ornate library that for more than a century has embodied the longstanding bond between the two neighboring allies.

The Haskell Free Library and Opera House opened in 1901 with the US-Canada border running right through the middle of the building, represented by a black line on the floor. Some parts of the library are in Vermont while others are in Quebec, although visitors can use both sides.

On the ground floor there are books in English and French while upstairs there’s a theater where people in the audience can sit in the US with their feet in Canada.

The Haskell Free Library isn’t your average library — the building is split by the US-Canada border line. For over a century, the library welcomed Canadians and Americans through one entrance on the US side of the border. In 2025, that changed. CNN’s Omar Jimenez takes you inside the library that’s trying to preserve the US-Canada bond.

“I used to go to the library there when I was a kid all the time,” Derby Line resident Janice Beadle told CNN. She said she’s lived on this border for 72 years and when she thinks about the changes to the library she’s “just angry.”

The library was intentionally built on the border to foster better understanding across both sides. For more than a century, Canadians could use the library’s front door on the US side without passing through an official international border crossing.

Until now. Last year the Trump administration prompted the library to build a separate entrance on the Canadian side. It was completed in June.

So as the library celebrates its 125th anniversary this month, it will do so with two official entrances – one for each country.

Christinne Muschi/The Canadian Press/AP

“I kind of thought, ‘how asinine,’” local resident Sharon Campbell told CNN. She shares a unique characteristic with the library in that the US-Canada border also runs through the middle of the home she shares with her husband — an inescapable dynamic in this unusual town.

“What are they gonna do next? Put a Border Patrol guy inside to make sure who’s from America?” she lamented. “It’s just a little too far.”

The process of adding a second entrance may have begun 10 days into President Donald Trump’s second term, when then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem visited the library.

Two weeks later, Sylvie Boudreau, then president of the library’s board of trustees, said she was summoned to a meeting with a US Customs and Border Protection officer, a Border Patrol agent and a member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

That’s when Boudreau learned she would preside over the end of one of the most unique bonds between the United States and Canada.

She said she was told that on October 1, 2025, the sidewalk that allowed Canadian access to the unified American entrance would be closed. Instead, Canadians would have to go around to an official border checkpoint, cross into the United States there, and then come back to enter the library.

Daphne Lemelin/AFP/Getty Images

“We didn’t receive anything in writing,” she told CNN. “I said, ‘I do not agree with this,’ but I know there’s nothing I can do,” Boudreau said of the meeting.

To some, the change was emblematic of what would become a further distancing in already-strained US-Canada relations. And aside from ending a longstanding tradition, it created an immediate problem for Boudreau.

“We have people, kids from schools around Canada, coming in buses to the library,” she said. “Most of them don’t have passports.”

So, she and library leaders came up with a solution.

It started as a temporary entrance out of an old emergency exit on the Canadian side of the building. To build something more permanent, would be expensive — about $650,000, the library estimated.

The library appealed to the public and “it went crazy,” Boudreau said. Library officials were able to raise more than $300,000 in donations for a new entrance, she said.

“It cost a fortune, but I feel safer for it,” Boudreau told CNN. “Because they are in Canada, they’re entering from Canada, and leaving back into Canada.”

She resigned shortly after the entrance was completed.

Her successor, Rodger Coupe, told CNN, “The intent of the library was to foster a relationship across the border, to have Americans understand Canadians and Canadians understand Americans.”

But US Customs and Border Protection officials insisted the decision to end the previous arrangement was because of safety.

In a statement to CNN, a spokesperson for US Customs and Border Protection wrote, “Drug traffickers and smugglers were exploiting the fact that Canadians could use the US entrance without going through customs. We are ending such exploitation by criminals and protecting Americans.”

CNN did not immediately find instances of drug trafficking through the library specifically, but in 2011 multiple people were involved in smuggling firearms using library facilities, according to the Department of Justice.

Justin Lane/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

Firearms purchased in Florida were put in small backpacks and stashed in a trashcan in the library bathroom, the department said. Another man later picked them up to transport into Quebec. He pleaded guilty to unlawful exportation of firearms from the US to Canada.

More recently, in June 2026, a woman from Chile bought a Canadian and American ticket to a performance at the library, entered through Canada, and then once inside changed clothing and tried to exit into the United States, according to the Vermont US Attorney’s Office. She was arrested outside the library and pleaded guilty to illegal entry.

Despite these examples, Boudreau rejected the argument that the library was the problem. She said she does see border violations from time to time but maintained they were not predominantly at the library or on its sidewalk.

“It’s other places, it’s outside,” she said, adding that she reports offenses to authorities on both sides of the border. Boudreau said she was a Canadian border services agent for 20 years before retiring in 2019.

A bigger issue with the library, Boudreau said, was that families and other groups on either side of the border would use it as a meeting place for reunions, potlucks or other gatherings unrelated to the facility.

“That was one of the things we stopped after Covid,” she said, and it’s why the library’s website says in bold, “Family/friend reunions or cross-border visits are not allowed.”

Coupe told CNN, “We’re under strict observation by both the US Border Patrol and the RCMP.”

The logistical complications of a facility that straddles the border are unavoidable.

“If somebody wants to mow the lawn on the Canadian side, we have to have permission,” said Evelyn Coupe, who is secretary for the board of trustees and married to Rodger, its president.

But when CNN visited in September, those logistical challenges were out of sight and the library hummed with a steady stream of visitors. Some of them took advantage of the building’s premiere photo opportunity: straddling the border line with one foot in the US and the other in Canada while holding the flags of both countries.

It’s the very spirit Boudreau and library leaders worked hard to preserve.

“It was a pain” and “cost a fortune,” she told CNN. But she’s happy. “It was a big achievement.”

在这个约有 700 人的边境小镇，无论政治立场如何，你都无法将美国和加拿大分开。

驾车行驶在街道上，有两件事格外引人注目：一条通往美加边境检查站的下坡通道，以及一座装饰独特的华丽图书馆，这座图书馆一个多世纪以来一直象征着这两个邻近盟友之间的长期纽带。

哈斯克尔免费图书馆暨歌剧院于1901年开放，美加边境线正好穿过建筑中心，在地板上用一条黑线标示。图书馆的部分区域位于佛蒙特州，部分区域位于魁北克省，但游客可以同时使用两侧的区域。

一楼摆放着英文和法文书籍，楼上则是一个剧院，观众可以坐在美国，脚却放在加拿大。

哈斯克尔免费图书馆并非普通的图书馆——这座建筑被美加边境线一分为二。一个多世纪以来，图书馆一直通过美国一侧的入口迎接加拿大人和美国人。但到了2025年，情况发生了改变。CNN记者奥马尔·吉梅内斯将带您走进这座致力于维系美加友谊的图书馆。

“我小时候经常去那里的图书馆，”德比莱恩居民詹妮丝·比德尔告诉CNN。她说她已经在边境地区住了72年，每当想到图书馆的变迁，她都“非常生气”。

这座图书馆特意建在边境线上，旨在促进两国人民之间的相互了解。一个多世纪以来，加拿大人无需经过官方的国际边境口岸，即可从美国一侧的正门进入图书馆。

直到去年，特朗普政府促使图书馆在加拿大一侧修建了一个单独的入口。该入口已于今年六月竣工。

因此，在本月图书馆庆祝其成立 125 周年之际，它将设立两个正式入口——每个国家一个。

克里斯汀·穆斯基/加拿大通讯社/美联社

“我当时就想，‘这太荒谬了’，”当地居民莎伦·坎贝尔告诉CNN。她和图书馆有一个共同点：美加边境线也穿过她和丈夫居住的房子——在这个不寻常的小镇，这是无法回避的现实。

“他们下一步打算怎么办？派个边境巡逻队的人进去，看看谁是美国人吗？”她抱怨道，“这有点太过分了。”

增设第二个入口的进程可能始于唐纳德·特朗普总统第二个任期开始的 10 天，当时的国土安全部长克里斯蒂·诺姆参观了该图书馆。

两周后，时任图书馆理事会主席的西尔维·布德罗表示，她被召去与美国海关和边境保护局官员、边境巡逻队特工和加拿大皇家骑警成员开会。

就在那时，布德罗得知她将见证美国和加拿大之间最独特的纽带之一的终结。

她说，她被告知，从2025年10月1日起，加拿大人可以通过人行道进入美加统一入口。届时，加拿大人必须绕道前往官方边境检查站，从那里进入美国，然后再返回图书馆。

Daphne Lemelin/AFP/Getty Images

“我们没有收到任何书面文件，”她告诉CNN。“我说过，‘我不同意这样做’，但我知道我无能为力，”布德罗在谈到这次会面时说道。

在一些人看来，这一变化象征着本已紧张的美加关系将进一步疏远。除了终结一项长期传统之外，这也给布德罗带来了迫在眉睫的问题。

她说：“我们看到来自加拿大各地学校的孩子们乘巴士来图书馆。他们大多数都没有护照。”

于是，她和图书馆领导们想出了一个解决方案。

最初，这只是从大楼加拿大一侧的一个旧紧急出口临时开辟的一个入口。建造一个更永久的入口将耗资不菲——图书馆估计大约需要65万美元。

图书馆向公众发出呼吁后，“反响非常热烈”，布德罗说道。她还表示，图书馆官员成功筹集了超过30万美元的捐款，用于修建新的入口。

“虽然花了不少钱，但我感觉更安全了，”布德罗告诉CNN。“因为他们身处加拿大，他们从加拿大入境，然后再从加拿大出境。”

入口竣工后不久，她就辞职了。

她的继任者罗杰·库普告诉 CNN：“图书馆的目的是促进两国人民之间的关系，让美国人了解加拿大人，让加拿大人了解美国人。”

但美国海关和边境保护局官员坚称，终止先前安排的决定是出于安全考虑。

美国海关与边境保护局发言人在给CNN的一份声明中写道：“毒贩和走私者利用加拿大人可以免检入境美国这一事实。我们正在制止犯罪分子的这种剥削行为，并保护美国公民。”

CNN 没有立即发现通过图书馆进行毒品贩运的具体案例，但据司法部称，2011 年有多人利用图书馆设施走私枪支。

Justin Lane/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

警方称，在佛罗里达州购买的枪支被装进小背包，藏在图书馆洗手间的垃圾桶里。之后，另一名男子取走了这些枪支，准备运往魁北克省。他承认非法向加拿大出口枪支。

最近，据佛蒙特州联邦检察官办公室称，2026年6月，一名智利女子购买了加拿大和美国的演出门票，从加拿大入境，进入图书馆后更换了衣服，试图从美国出境。她在图书馆外被捕，并承认非法入境。

尽管有这些例子，布德罗仍然驳斥了图书馆本身是问题所在的说法。她说她确实偶尔会看到有人违反边境规定，但她坚持认为这些行为主要并非发生在图书馆或其人行道上。

“是在其他地方，是在外面，”她说道，并补充说她会向边境两侧的当局举报违法行为。布德罗表示，她在2019年退休前曾担任加拿大边境服务官员20年。

布德罗表示，图书馆更大的问题是，边境两侧的家庭和其他团体会将其用作聚会场所，举行团聚、聚餐或其他与图书馆无关的聚会。

“那是我们在新冠疫情后停止的事情之一，”她说，这也是为什么图书馆的网站上用粗体字写着“不允许家庭/朋友聚会或跨境访问”。

库普告诉 CNN：“我们正受到美国边境巡逻队和加拿大皇家骑警的严格监视。”

跨越边境的设施所带来的后勤复杂性是不可避免的。

“如果有人想在加拿大一侧修剪草坪，我们必须获得许可，”董事会秘书伊芙琳·库佩说道，她的丈夫罗杰是董事会主席。

但CNN九月份到访时，这些后勤方面的挑战已不复存在，图书馆里人流络绎不绝。一些游客还利用了馆内绝佳的拍照机会：一只脚踏在美国境内，另一只脚踏在加拿大境内，同时手持两国国旗，站在美加边境线上。

这正是布德罗和图书馆领导们努力想要保留的精神。

她告诉CNN：“这很麻烦”，而且“花费巨大”。但她很高兴。“这是一项巨大的成就。”