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historiumI’ve done a lot of research on luxury passenger rail travel between 1880 and the start of WW2. I've been asked a few times to share some of my research, so here is my attempt at a basic overview. I hope people find it helpful.
I am cutting this both due to length but also due to references to sex tourism. I do not go into details, but I thought it would be better to acknowledge it than to pretend it isn't part of the history.
Luxury rail travel started with Pullman Cars in America. They pushed technology forward and set a standard. The Pullman cars were large, wide, had bathrooms and gave a smooth ride to passengers. Pullman trains didn’t bend to fit infrastructure, infrastructure was changed to accommodate them. George Pullman sought to create luxury hotels on wheels, and he did. Before Pullman cars, travelers risked spine injuries, carbon monoxide poisoning and faced a serious lack of hygiene.
George Pullman explained his innovations to a man from Belgium named Georges Nagelmakers. Nagelmakers took all information on new wheels, axles and other breakthroughs and copied them to make his own cars. Those cars become The Orient Express.
The Orient Express was not one single line or route, but many routes. Which routes counted as part of The Orient Express and in what years it operated is surprisingly controversial. Two books I have on the topic have very different route maps. I am going to use the term The Orient Express as broadly as possible to refer to these interconnected routes that were mostly run by Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits, the company started by Nagelmakers.
[Source: Wikimedia Commons]
One of my books has a route map that broadly agrees with this one. Another shows the ‘Venice Simplon Orient Express’ reaching into Spain, Beruit, Cairo, Baghdad and St. Petersburg. Takes vary, but that the service connected London and Calais at least as far as Turkey is important.
The Orient Express ran Pullman Cars in The United Kingdom as Pullman had managed to get a foothold there and had a strong reputation. On the continent, some of the cars over the years were Pullman but they were mostly made by companies that had copied his designs.
A lot of writers and film makers assume that since modern trains rock, trains in previous eras rocked as much if not more. This seems to be a product of The Coconut Effect (TV Tropes Link). In the 1920s people engaging in leisure travel were mostly in heavy cars on fairly new track. Today, we have very light train cars and some of it is on very old track. First person accounts of The Orient Express say that the ride was very smooth. There were sometimes slight vibrations and that is why they gave up on waiters in the dining cars wearing powdered wigs. Wine glasses could be filled to the brim and men could shave without worry. Some private Pullman cars had barber chairs set up for shaves.
North American rail travel versus The Orient Express:
Broadly speaking, until the 1930s American sleeper cars were very open with no walls between passengers. A solo traveler might sit facing a total stranger. At night, when the nooks were converted for night time use, the forward facing passenger would take the bottom bunk. The forward facing tickets cost more. The person on the backward facing bench would take the top bunk. Curtains were put up, but that is all that separated passengers even while sleeping. Sleeper car passengers would have access to parlor cars and dining if available.
Images of North American open sleepers:
This painting was likely for an advertisement. The actual width of the car is a bit exaggerated, but you can see a nook set up for day use, one nook being converted to night use by a porter, and one fully curtained for night use.
Photo of a sleeper car passenger on a Canadian National Rail Car from 1937.
Source
Another photo showing sleeper car nooks in various configurations.
When cars were furnished for use in The Orient Express they had walled compartments. The thought was that their potential passengers would not tolerate the more open carriages of North America.
Images of The Orient Express:
This is compartment for one person, set up for daytime use. The sink would fold up and cabinet close when not in use.
Bathroom of a private compartment from 1920.
Passengers would mingle in parlors and in the dining car.
On The Orient Express food was prepared on the trains and they refreshed their supplies of ingredients at various stations. Additional kitchens would be added for kosher food or for halal food to follow strict religious guidelines. Food was lavish, prepared by top chefs and every sort of request could be catered to.
In North America, how food was handled varied by route. Some trains would stop for meals. In the Southwest part of America some of the passenger trains would stop at Harvey Houses set up along the line. Along the Canadian rail lines, I've seen references both to onboard dining cars and also sleeper cars stopping at stations for lavish, multi-course meals.
In 1932 Pullman did start to introduce train cars with compartments to the North American market. They were also lighter to be cheaper to operate as America was in the The Great Depression.
Private Cars:
There are two ways that private rail cars work. They can be attached to the public train system and be pulled along. It can be a single car or multiple cars. They usually have their own supplies of food, water and power.
It is also possible for private rail cars to also have their own engines and travel independent of publicly accessible trains. While these did and still do exist in North America and Europe, and possibly elsewhere, it is hard to get reliable information on them.
Private cars and trains were mostly for royalty, world leaders and the very richest of the rich. The British Royal Family stored several private cars at Calais for travel on the European continent. Sometimes people would own their own cars and trains, sometimes they would rent for excursions. The Orient Express would completely refurnish cars for people wishing to rent private ones.
Private cars and trains still exist today. I’ve spotted the vintage private train run by Charter Steel on more than one occasion. Here is the end of their back car where you can see the back deck. One of the perks of private cars and trains is access to a back deck.
I took this picture out of curiosity while traveling on The Empire Builder from Chicago to Seattle. It lead me to discover the existence of private trains.
Even the fabulously wealthy, nobles and certain princes traveled in public cars with other passengers which leads us to...
Train travel and the erosion of class boundaries:
Except for world leaders and the most powerful captains of industry, suddenly travel was no longer private. Train companies sold a first class ticket to anyone who could pay. The nobles and fabulously wealthy also used the same stations and platforms as other patrons going on less ritzy trains. Members of the nobility used to live lives that were very separate from other people. They went to different schools, ate at different places, traveled in private carriages and so forth. Traveling nobles often stayed at each other’s estates. There were layers of social insulation around them. Suddenly, Dukes and Duchesses were along side shipping magnates, actors and writers. It was possible on The Orient Express to stay in one's compartment the whole time and take meals there, but it meant missing out on some of the pleasures of the trip.
How people with valets and maids interacted with their staff was a mystery to the general public until train travel. Suddenly their lives were somewhat on display. For example, Leopold II of Belgium being mean and rebuking his valet, a Hapsburg feeding her dogs only milk-fed calf fried in Normandy Butter and many other details of the lives of the nobles we have because they were revealed through train travel. In addition to mixing old money, nouveau riche and the occasional upper middle class person splurging on travel, people from England, Turkey, Iran and many other countries traveled together. American movie stars, entire ballet companies, diplomats chained to their attache cases, and noted people of the era like Harry Houdini also joined the mix of people in first class cabins. Writers, including Agatha Christie, rode The Orient Express.
It was possible to see the rich in famous and their wood paneled surroundings through the train windows or to visit train stations just to see stratas of society that was previously hidden from view.
The convenience, speed, reach and luxury of trains outweighed privacy and lead to a lot of social barriers being eroded.
Railway Hotels:
Many historic hotels began as railway hotels. Railways built everything from small inns to massive sprawling formal hotels to put their passengers overnight. Some railways even developed towns or tourism along their own routes to solidify their business. The land that is now Glacier National Park was protected from development because a rail company bought it to preserve views along the Empire Builder line. That so many American and Canadian rail lines connect to National Parks is no accident. The rail companies sought to protect and develop recreation and preservation along their lines.
For sheer majesty and splendor, it’s hard to beat the grand railway hotels of Canada. Château Frontenac was built by the Canadian Pacific Railway for their passengers.
[Creative Commons licensed image]
On the more rustic side of things, here is the view from inside one of the private cabins one can rent on the grounds of Belton Chalet in Montana, just outside Glacier National Park:
[Credit and also the random clutter strewn around: me]
Sex Tourism:
On The Orient Express the conductors had a side business of procuring companionship for passengers. It took a lot of coordination as the sex workers started and ended work in different cities. Conductors used telegraph messages to deal with the logistics of getting sex workers to the right trains and then back home.
One reason why people traveled to Istanbul, then called Constantinople, was for sex tourism. The speed and accessibility of The Orient Express made it possible for more people to take trips for purposes of sex. The child prostitutes were euphemistically known as ‘guides’.
According to one of of the books I’ve read on the matter, Orient Express by E. H. Cookridge, ‘pleasures of Oriental sex’ was the main reason people visited Constantinople in the mid 19th century. I think he is likely overstating matters, or rather using a very narrow definition of 'tourist' as the book came out in 1957.
Zacharias Basileos Sahar, or Basil Zaharoff, was either a child prostitute or a pimp depending on which source you go by. He became a prominent arms dealer who rode the Orient Express and always stayed in compartment number 7. He conducted business almost entirely on the train, riding it back and forth regularly. At one point he was the richest man in the world. It would be a very large tangent for this post, but I do recommend reading up on him if trains, star crossed romances and rise to power stories interest you. His Wikipedia page is still actively edited so definitely double check sources when reading about him.
Luxury Train Travel and World Wars:
The Orient Express stopped service during the world wars. The Orient Express was made possible by rail standardization. There has been resistance to standardizing rail between countries in Europe was due to worry about the effect of such infrastructure on major conflicts. Those worries turned out to be well founded. In North America, World War II had economic impacts to consumers and steel prices, but did not end passenger rail. Passenger rail after WW2 in North America, Europe, Asia and elsewhere is a a topic for another day!
In conclusion:
I focused a lot on the details and images I thought would be useful to people writing about train travel in those eras. I've left out a lot of political and military details and company history. I also left out talk of spycraft. My source books talk up moving spies around as a big part of train business, but are light on concrete details. I bought reference books on the topic when the library wasn't much help. Also, I've spent time on modern sleeper cars, restored passenger cars and in railroad hotels. Some of my own pictures are here, but I do have a lot more. So, if you have any questions or need more reference images to get a handle on things for your own projects, please ask and I will help if I can. While trains for industrial purposes have been obsessively catalogued and archived, down to tracking individual parts and gears, information on leisure travel can be hard to pin down.
Sources and Further Reading -
Orient Express by E. H. Cookridge – Lots of great info, especially if you are interested in reading more on The Man in Compartment Number 7. It has very few pictures, and the ones in my edition are small and low quality.
The Orient Express: The History of the World's Most Luxurious Train 1883–Present Day by Anthony Burton – This book has lavish and amazing pictures. This is the best visual resource I’ve found. And it’s back in print! You can just buy it in Amazon now ... Don't ask me how much I paid for this book on eBay a few years ago
Venice-Simplon Orient Express: The Return Of The World’s Most Celebrated Train by Shirley Sherwood – Lots of detailed historical info on the companies that ran the Orient Express and detail images of inlays.
The Cars of Pullman by Joe Welsh, Bill Howes and Kevin J. Holland – A good variety of images of passenger rail through the years.
The current train operating as the Orient Express has impressive bedrooms and cabins to look at. A lot of 'vintage' pictures you find on Tumblr and other places are actually moderns pictures from ads for this service.
List of Canadian Railway Hotels. The size and number of Canadian Railway Hotels speaks volumes about the power of rail tourism and how much rail passengers were catered to.
Very good resource on Pullman sleepers through the years.
Harvey Houses and Harvey Girls. That link is a good starting point for learning about Harvey Girls and the start of cultural tourism in the American Southwest. (updated link thanks to Texasdreamer01)
I am cutting this both due to length but also due to references to sex tourism. I do not go into details, but I thought it would be better to acknowledge it than to pretend it isn't part of the history.
Luxury rail travel started with Pullman Cars in America. They pushed technology forward and set a standard. The Pullman cars were large, wide, had bathrooms and gave a smooth ride to passengers. Pullman trains didn’t bend to fit infrastructure, infrastructure was changed to accommodate them. George Pullman sought to create luxury hotels on wheels, and he did. Before Pullman cars, travelers risked spine injuries, carbon monoxide poisoning and faced a serious lack of hygiene.
George Pullman explained his innovations to a man from Belgium named Georges Nagelmakers. Nagelmakers took all information on new wheels, axles and other breakthroughs and copied them to make his own cars. Those cars become The Orient Express.
The Orient Express was not one single line or route, but many routes. Which routes counted as part of The Orient Express and in what years it operated is surprisingly controversial. Two books I have on the topic have very different route maps. I am going to use the term The Orient Express as broadly as possible to refer to these interconnected routes that were mostly run by Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits, the company started by Nagelmakers.
[Source: Wikimedia Commons]
One of my books has a route map that broadly agrees with this one. Another shows the ‘Venice Simplon Orient Express’ reaching into Spain, Beruit, Cairo, Baghdad and St. Petersburg. Takes vary, but that the service connected London and Calais at least as far as Turkey is important.
The Orient Express ran Pullman Cars in The United Kingdom as Pullman had managed to get a foothold there and had a strong reputation. On the continent, some of the cars over the years were Pullman but they were mostly made by companies that had copied his designs.
A lot of writers and film makers assume that since modern trains rock, trains in previous eras rocked as much if not more. This seems to be a product of The Coconut Effect (TV Tropes Link). In the 1920s people engaging in leisure travel were mostly in heavy cars on fairly new track. Today, we have very light train cars and some of it is on very old track. First person accounts of The Orient Express say that the ride was very smooth. There were sometimes slight vibrations and that is why they gave up on waiters in the dining cars wearing powdered wigs. Wine glasses could be filled to the brim and men could shave without worry. Some private Pullman cars had barber chairs set up for shaves.
North American rail travel versus The Orient Express:
Broadly speaking, until the 1930s American sleeper cars were very open with no walls between passengers. A solo traveler might sit facing a total stranger. At night, when the nooks were converted for night time use, the forward facing passenger would take the bottom bunk. The forward facing tickets cost more. The person on the backward facing bench would take the top bunk. Curtains were put up, but that is all that separated passengers even while sleeping. Sleeper car passengers would have access to parlor cars and dining if available.
Images of North American open sleepers:
This painting was likely for an advertisement. The actual width of the car is a bit exaggerated, but you can see a nook set up for day use, one nook being converted to night use by a porter, and one fully curtained for night use.
Photo of a sleeper car passenger on a Canadian National Rail Car from 1937.
Source
Another photo showing sleeper car nooks in various configurations.
When cars were furnished for use in The Orient Express they had walled compartments. The thought was that their potential passengers would not tolerate the more open carriages of North America.
Images of The Orient Express:
This is compartment for one person, set up for daytime use. The sink would fold up and cabinet close when not in use.
Bathroom of a private compartment from 1920.
Passengers would mingle in parlors and in the dining car.
On The Orient Express food was prepared on the trains and they refreshed their supplies of ingredients at various stations. Additional kitchens would be added for kosher food or for halal food to follow strict religious guidelines. Food was lavish, prepared by top chefs and every sort of request could be catered to.
In North America, how food was handled varied by route. Some trains would stop for meals. In the Southwest part of America some of the passenger trains would stop at Harvey Houses set up along the line. Along the Canadian rail lines, I've seen references both to onboard dining cars and also sleeper cars stopping at stations for lavish, multi-course meals.
In 1932 Pullman did start to introduce train cars with compartments to the North American market. They were also lighter to be cheaper to operate as America was in the The Great Depression.
Private Cars:
There are two ways that private rail cars work. They can be attached to the public train system and be pulled along. It can be a single car or multiple cars. They usually have their own supplies of food, water and power.
It is also possible for private rail cars to also have their own engines and travel independent of publicly accessible trains. While these did and still do exist in North America and Europe, and possibly elsewhere, it is hard to get reliable information on them.
Private cars and trains were mostly for royalty, world leaders and the very richest of the rich. The British Royal Family stored several private cars at Calais for travel on the European continent. Sometimes people would own their own cars and trains, sometimes they would rent for excursions. The Orient Express would completely refurnish cars for people wishing to rent private ones.
Private cars and trains still exist today. I’ve spotted the vintage private train run by Charter Steel on more than one occasion. Here is the end of their back car where you can see the back deck. One of the perks of private cars and trains is access to a back deck.
I took this picture out of curiosity while traveling on The Empire Builder from Chicago to Seattle. It lead me to discover the existence of private trains.
Even the fabulously wealthy, nobles and certain princes traveled in public cars with other passengers which leads us to...
Train travel and the erosion of class boundaries:
Except for world leaders and the most powerful captains of industry, suddenly travel was no longer private. Train companies sold a first class ticket to anyone who could pay. The nobles and fabulously wealthy also used the same stations and platforms as other patrons going on less ritzy trains. Members of the nobility used to live lives that were very separate from other people. They went to different schools, ate at different places, traveled in private carriages and so forth. Traveling nobles often stayed at each other’s estates. There were layers of social insulation around them. Suddenly, Dukes and Duchesses were along side shipping magnates, actors and writers. It was possible on The Orient Express to stay in one's compartment the whole time and take meals there, but it meant missing out on some of the pleasures of the trip.
How people with valets and maids interacted with their staff was a mystery to the general public until train travel. Suddenly their lives were somewhat on display. For example, Leopold II of Belgium being mean and rebuking his valet, a Hapsburg feeding her dogs only milk-fed calf fried in Normandy Butter and many other details of the lives of the nobles we have because they were revealed through train travel. In addition to mixing old money, nouveau riche and the occasional upper middle class person splurging on travel, people from England, Turkey, Iran and many other countries traveled together. American movie stars, entire ballet companies, diplomats chained to their attache cases, and noted people of the era like Harry Houdini also joined the mix of people in first class cabins. Writers, including Agatha Christie, rode The Orient Express.
It was possible to see the rich in famous and their wood paneled surroundings through the train windows or to visit train stations just to see stratas of society that was previously hidden from view.
The convenience, speed, reach and luxury of trains outweighed privacy and lead to a lot of social barriers being eroded.
Railway Hotels:
Many historic hotels began as railway hotels. Railways built everything from small inns to massive sprawling formal hotels to put their passengers overnight. Some railways even developed towns or tourism along their own routes to solidify their business. The land that is now Glacier National Park was protected from development because a rail company bought it to preserve views along the Empire Builder line. That so many American and Canadian rail lines connect to National Parks is no accident. The rail companies sought to protect and develop recreation and preservation along their lines.
For sheer majesty and splendor, it’s hard to beat the grand railway hotels of Canada. Château Frontenac was built by the Canadian Pacific Railway for their passengers.
[Creative Commons licensed image]
On the more rustic side of things, here is the view from inside one of the private cabins one can rent on the grounds of Belton Chalet in Montana, just outside Glacier National Park:
[Credit and also the random clutter strewn around: me]
Sex Tourism:
On The Orient Express the conductors had a side business of procuring companionship for passengers. It took a lot of coordination as the sex workers started and ended work in different cities. Conductors used telegraph messages to deal with the logistics of getting sex workers to the right trains and then back home.
One reason why people traveled to Istanbul, then called Constantinople, was for sex tourism. The speed and accessibility of The Orient Express made it possible for more people to take trips for purposes of sex. The child prostitutes were euphemistically known as ‘guides’.
According to one of of the books I’ve read on the matter, Orient Express by E. H. Cookridge, ‘pleasures of Oriental sex’ was the main reason people visited Constantinople in the mid 19th century. I think he is likely overstating matters, or rather using a very narrow definition of 'tourist' as the book came out in 1957.
Zacharias Basileos Sahar, or Basil Zaharoff, was either a child prostitute or a pimp depending on which source you go by. He became a prominent arms dealer who rode the Orient Express and always stayed in compartment number 7. He conducted business almost entirely on the train, riding it back and forth regularly. At one point he was the richest man in the world. It would be a very large tangent for this post, but I do recommend reading up on him if trains, star crossed romances and rise to power stories interest you. His Wikipedia page is still actively edited so definitely double check sources when reading about him.
Luxury Train Travel and World Wars:
The Orient Express stopped service during the world wars. The Orient Express was made possible by rail standardization. There has been resistance to standardizing rail between countries in Europe was due to worry about the effect of such infrastructure on major conflicts. Those worries turned out to be well founded. In North America, World War II had economic impacts to consumers and steel prices, but did not end passenger rail. Passenger rail after WW2 in North America, Europe, Asia and elsewhere is a a topic for another day!
In conclusion:
I focused a lot on the details and images I thought would be useful to people writing about train travel in those eras. I've left out a lot of political and military details and company history. I also left out talk of spycraft. My source books talk up moving spies around as a big part of train business, but are light on concrete details. I bought reference books on the topic when the library wasn't much help. Also, I've spent time on modern sleeper cars, restored passenger cars and in railroad hotels. Some of my own pictures are here, but I do have a lot more. So, if you have any questions or need more reference images to get a handle on things for your own projects, please ask and I will help if I can. While trains for industrial purposes have been obsessively catalogued and archived, down to tracking individual parts and gears, information on leisure travel can be hard to pin down.
Sources and Further Reading -
Orient Express by E. H. Cookridge – Lots of great info, especially if you are interested in reading more on The Man in Compartment Number 7. It has very few pictures, and the ones in my edition are small and low quality.
The Orient Express: The History of the World's Most Luxurious Train 1883–Present Day by Anthony Burton – This book has lavish and amazing pictures. This is the best visual resource I’ve found. And it’s back in print! You can just buy it in Amazon now ... Don't ask me how much I paid for this book on eBay a few years ago
Venice-Simplon Orient Express: The Return Of The World’s Most Celebrated Train by Shirley Sherwood – Lots of detailed historical info on the companies that ran the Orient Express and detail images of inlays.
The Cars of Pullman by Joe Welsh, Bill Howes and Kevin J. Holland – A good variety of images of passenger rail through the years.
The current train operating as the Orient Express has impressive bedrooms and cabins to look at. A lot of 'vintage' pictures you find on Tumblr and other places are actually moderns pictures from ads for this service.
List of Canadian Railway Hotels. The size and number of Canadian Railway Hotels speaks volumes about the power of rail tourism and how much rail passengers were catered to.
Very good resource on Pullman sleepers through the years.
Harvey Houses and Harvey Girls. That link is a good starting point for learning about Harvey Girls and the start of cultural tourism in the American Southwest. (updated link thanks to Texasdreamer01)
