From gadget king to royal Luddite – the day an irascible Prince Philip took revenge on an annoying Kindle screen (in the bathtub…!)
- Duke of Edinburgh said: ‘Everything not made by God was made by an engineer’
- But he had a dim view of e-readers and on-screen marketing…
He was known as a technology enthusiast.
Whether it was piloting fighter jets, sailing boats or subscribing to Flying Saucer Review, Prince Philip Royal spent hours poring over the workings of mechanisms and machines.
Today it is easy to forget that for much of his time as the queen’s husband and consort, Philip was a decidedly modernizing force in a rather stuffy monarchy, often to the discomfort of the courtiers.
The Duke of Edinburgh inspects a cinema film of an AA Bofors gun he saw in action during his visit to British troops in Germany
Philip at the controls of a Queen’s Flight Heron aircraft as he leaves Heathrow Airport for his two-day visit to the Brussels Universal and International Exhibition in 1958
Gadgets in particular were favorites. It is reported that as a young naval officer, Philip had air-conditioned his own quarters with a system of fans, radiators and thermostats.
Some claim he invented an early tea-making device – before the commercial hit Teasmade came along.
More seriously, Philip was president of the British Association for the Advancement of Science.
According to the Royal Collection Trust, his interest “in many ways reflects and continues the role of the great-great-great-grandfather, Prince Albert.”
And when a giant water turbine was later installed on the Windsor estate to power Windsor Castle, few doubted that the Duke of Edinburgh was a big part of the planning.
As he once put it, “Everything not made by God was made by an engineer.”
Even towards the end of his life, the restless Philip was keen to keep up with the latest gadgets and, for example, devoured books on his Kindle screen.
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, always curious about how things work, watches exhibitions at the Household Cavalry Museum with the late Queen, during the Horse Guards Parade
Prince Philip holds a book about artist and architect Michelangelo at King’s Lynn Station after taking the train from King’s Cross in London
Prince Philip spent much of his time at Wood Farm on the Sandringham estate. While he engaged in traditional activities such as carriage driving, Philip was keen to keep up with the latest gadgets
Wood Farm in Sandringham, where the ‘Kindle’ incident took place
Until he lost his patience.
According to author Tina Brown in her best-selling book The Palace Papers, “Philip often extolled the joys of his Kindle until, disgusted by all the direct marketing of books he didn’t want to read, he threw it in the bathtub.”
This had apparently taken place in what Brown describes as his ‘man cave’ at Wood Farm, a modest house on the Sandringham Estate where the Duke of Edinburgh spent much of his retirement reading and painting.