Agatha Christie (1890-1976) Agatha Christie was born Agatha May Clarissa Miller in Devon, England in 1890, the youngest of three children in a conservative, well-to-do family. Taught at home by a governess and tutors, as a child Agatha never attended school. In 1914, at the age of 24, she married Archie Christie, a World War I fighter pilot. While he was off at war, she worked as a nurse. It was while working in a hospital during the war that Christie first came up with the idea of writing a detective novel. Although it was completed in a year, it wasn't published until 1920, five years later. Christie ultimately became the acknowledged Queen of the Golden Age. In all, she wrote over 66 novels. In 1971 she was awarded the high honor of becoming a Dame of the British Empire.