Life on the line: Richford farmhouse straddles two countries

y Erica Jacobson
Free Press Staff Writer (Burlington Free Press - 7/28/02)

Dora and Lyle Hurtubise can see Canada from their kitchen table on a clear
day.

Cloudy days, too, since its only a matter of feet from their Richford
kitchen table to their Abercorn, Quebec, kitchen.

A trip to the downstairs bathroom is also an international affair. So is
admiring the family's most recent portrait in the living room. Dora
positioned the framed photograph directly on the border. Upstairs, the
couple put their daughters to bed in Canada for years.

Now a spare bedroom, the room is a favorite with guests.

"We've had relatives come from the big city and we'd say, 'You're sleeping
in Canada,'" Dora said. "It's like a big joke."

The Hurtubises, like at least a dozen other Vermonters, own one house split
between two countries. These international abodes are a New England
phenomenon. Some predate the permanent fixing of the border in 1842. Others
were intentionally built on the border to take advantage of differing laws
between the two countries.

Of the more than 300 buildings that once breached the Canada-U.S. border
from Maine to upstate New York, less than 150 remain. Vermont has one of the
most well-known -- the Haskell Free Library and Opera House which straddles
the border at Derby Line and Stanstead, Quebec.

Beyond that, no one really keeps count of how many buildings are on the
border. But all are endangered species thanks to a 1960 treaty banning
construction within 10 feet of either side of the border. Kyle Hipsley,
deputy commissioner of the International Boundary Commission in Washington,
D.C., said that U.S. government's goal is to have a border that is clearly
defined and recognizable. Houses interrupt that 20-foot swath of no-man's
land, so the commission isn't sorry to see the structures slowly go.

"These line houses are gradually disappearing," Hipsley said. "It just takes
time.

"We hope eventually over the next 40 to 50 years, everything will be gone."

Twice the tax
Life on the border is a relatively peaceful existence for the Hurtubises.

The Hurtubises daily see the 20-foot clear cut strip through the trees that
marks the border as it snakes up the hill across the valley from their
farmhouse. The family's cows were once barred from grazing in their Canadian
pastures because of a threat of hoof-and-mouth disease. Occasionally, they
spot a person who may have sneaked across the border and call the Border
Patrol.

Because their house sits in both countries, the couple was given the choice
of nationalities. They decided to remain U.S. citizens and send their
children to Richford schools. Geographically, it made sense since the road
they live on dead-ends only a few yards into Canada. They get all of their
utilities from the United States, although they could have chosen Canadian
companies. Being divided by the border can come to mind but once a year,
Dora said, tax time. The couple receives two tax bills, one from each
country, but only for the land they own in each nation.

"We're taxed on both sides," Lyle said. "You can't get away from taxes."

Glen Elder, a University of Vermont professor of geography, said the
Hurtubises' attitude toward the border is natural.

"Your domestic home space, you never really think of it in national terms,"
he said. "We're going into the bathroom, we're going into the bedroom. We're
not going into Canada. In reality, borders are sort of symbolic. They're
more important for people who are away from them than for the people who are
right up next to them."

And the boundary commission's desire to have a clear and effective border is
a challenge at such densely settled places as Beebe Plain and Derby Line.
There, renters in apartment buildings straddling the line can choose whether
to get their utilities from Canada or the United States. Elder has even
heard of one apartment house in Beebe Plain where the first floor is in the
United States and the second floor is in Canada. Despite the obvious tangle
that a border can create, Elder said that some straddling structures should
remain.

"I think they should be preserved," he said. "(It's a) snapshot of the
border at another time and place."

A house divided will stand
Lyle bought the farm in 1946 with its 35 acres in the United States. The
neighboring 90 acres in Canada were going to be sold for taxes, so he bought
those too. "That's what made this farm a farm," he said.

The couple married in 1950 and have lived on the farm ever since. They think
the house, with its square nails and hand-hewn beams, was built years before
the border was officially set.

They've gotten used to the Border Patrol helicopters flying overhead.
Japanese film crews once visited to make a documentary at their home about
peaceful borders. Dora keeps a scrapbook of stories about the house done by
both Canadian and U.S. media.

The U.S. government has no active program to buy out owners of houses on the
border, relying on a combination of time and attrition. Obviously, buildings
like the Haskell Free Library intentionally built on the border between
Derby Line and Rock Island, Quebec, will survive. It's single-family homes
like the Hurtubises that the boundary commission hopes will eventually fall
into disrepair and be abandoned.

Don't count on it, the Hurtubises said.

"Oh, absolutely not," Lyle said. "Not as long as our eyes are open."