Q&A YOU ASK, WE ANSWER

How long did the Orient Express operate?

SHORT ANSWER Travellers enjoyed the train service for more than a century – and yes, there really was a murderBy the time Agatha Christie penned her murder mystery classic based on the luxury train route from Istanbul to Paris, the real service was already half a century old. It was the brainchild of Belgian businessman Georges Nagelmackers after he toured the US in train pioneer George Pullman’s sleeper cars and established, in 1872, the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits.The Orient Express, the pinnacle of his ambitions for long-distance, high-luxury train travel in Europe, had its maiden journey 11 years later. In October 1883, it set off from Paris and took 13 days to cover the 1,700-plus miles to Istanbul (then Constantinople). Well, almost. The end of journey was via steamship, as the remaining section of railway line still hadn’t been completed.The ‘king of trains, train of kings’ operated (in differing forms, routes and names) until December 2009, although it had stopped going as far as Istanbul by 1977. And during that lengthy run, there really was a murder on the Orient Express – and only a year after Christie’s famous book was published. Maria Farcasanu, the director of a fashion school in Bucharest, was robbed of her belongings and pushed out of a moving carriage in 1935. The culprit, Karl Strasser, was caught – but not by a moustachioed private detective.