The first railway line in the Bulgarian lands – Ruse–Varna – is marking 160 years since its opening. To mark the anniversary, BDZ is offering free admission to the National Transport Museum in Ruse every Saturday and Sunday in November.
The museum is housed in the building of the first railway station in the Bulgarian lands. Visitors can view exhibits from the history of railway transport, including steam locomotive No. 148, the “Sultanie” salon carriage used by Sultan Abdulaziz, as well as the personal carriages of Tsar Ferdinand.
Opening hours are every day from 09:00 to 17:00. The museum building is part of the railway station complex in Ruse, constructed between 1864 and 1866.
How construction began
On September 1, 1861, a sultan’s edict was issued for the construction of the Ruse–Varna line, considered the second railway line in the Balkans. Due to a lack of sufficient funds of its own, the Sublime Porte awarded the construction under a concession.
The work was awarded to the company of the English brothers Trevor and Henry Barkley. The contract was signed in October 1863. The representative of the Ottoman Empire was Musurus Pasha, while the British company was represented by William Gladstone. He provided a guarantee of 1 million francs and undertook to have the line built within three years.
The first groundbreaking ceremony took place on May 21, 1864, on the banks of the Danube River in Ruse. Construction began simultaneously from Ruse and Varna, and work trains gradually began running on the completed sections.
Midhat Pasha’s journey
By December 1865, the rails laid from Ruse and Varna covered a total of approximately 92 kilometers. Regular service had not yet begun, and the opening of the line had been postponed several times.
On November 7, 1866, the then-governor of Ruse, Midhat Pasha, traveled from Ruse to Varna without changing horses and declared the line open. This date marks the beginning of railway communications in what is now the territory of Bulgaria.
The anniversary connects the historic event with an opportunity to visit the place where some of the oldest examples of railway transport in Bulgaria are preserved.
Sources: focus-news.net