Editing Murder on the Orient Express (section)

==Writing==
The [[Lindbergh kidnapping|kidnapping and murder]] of [[Charles Lindbergh]]'s son in 1932 inspired that element in Christie's novel two years later. The novel used many elements of the real life case: a young child, firstborn of the family, was kidnapped for ransom directly from the crib, the parents were famous, the father was a well-known pilot and the mother pregnant, and the ransom was paid but the child found dead soon after. An innocent, but perhaps loose-lipped, maid employed by Lindbergh's parents was suspected of involvement in the crime. After being harshly interrogated by police, she killed herself.<ref name="autogenerated105">{{Cite book |last1=Sanders |first1=Dennis |title=The Agatha Christie Companion |last2=Lovallo |first2=Len |date=1984 |publisher=[[Delacorte Press]] |isbn=978-0425118450 |location=New York City |pages=105–08}}</ref>

Two less notable events helped inspire her novel: Agatha Christie's first journey on the Orient Express in late 1928, and a blizzard near [[Çerkezköy, Turkey]], that thwarted the Orient Express's progress for six days just a few months later, in February 1929.<ref name="autogenerated105" />

Flooding from rainfall that washed sections of track away in December 1931 halted Christie's return from her husband's archaeological dig at [[Nineveh]] aboard an Orient Express for 24 hours. Her authorised biography details that event in a complete quotation of a letter to her husband, which describes several passengers on her train who inspired both the plot and the characters in her novel, including an American, Mrs. Hilton, who inspired Mrs. Hubbard.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Morgan |first=Janet |author-link=Janet Morgan, Lady Balfour of Burleigh |title=Agatha Christie, A Biography |date=1984 |publisher=[[HarperCollins]] |isbn=0-00-216330-6 |location=New York City |pages=201–04}}</ref>