Peter Bromhead: Apple Watch 70 years too late

Dick Tracy and Peter Bromhead were two early adopters of what went on to be known as the Apple Watch. Illustration / Peter Bromhead

As a boy, I was extremely wary of my woodwork master, Mr Ruffett, who was noted for bringing down a steel ruler on the knuckles of inattentive children.

I was particularly apprehensive about igniting his wrath because I couldn't execute even the simplest woodworking exercise, such as turning raw wood into pointless household ornaments, like a mantelpiece pipe stand.

This exercise seemed even more pointless than usual, as nobody in my household smoked a pipe, or was likely to in the immediate future.

Because of my ineptitude, I never moved on and each term I faced the same construction exercise.

In my last year at that school, bored with constructing pipe stands, when Ruffett's back was turned I instead created a make-believe wristwatch cut from a thin balsawood sheet and taped it to my wrist.

It wasn't an ordinary watch, but a pretend talking two-way radio wristwatch - as worn by the ace detective Dick Tracy, a popular American comic strip hero, greatly admired by kids on both sides of the Atlantic.

Of course, it was inevitable that I would catch the eye of Mr Ruffett while amusing myself talking to an imaginary watch.

Making a sudden beeline to my woodworking bench, his steel ruler raised, his beady eye homed in on my balsawood creation.

"What have we here?" he chortled aloud, holding my arm up to the class.

"It's a replica talking watch," I squeaked by way of explanation, adding: "A Dick Tracy two-way radio watch."

I was then frog-marched out to the front of the class, my arm still held aloft, where Mr Ruffett addressed the assembly.

"Forgive me, children, for wasting your time on elementary carpentry exercises, when we have a genius among us who's constructed a talking watch.

"Pray silence everybody, while Professor Broomstick kindly gives us an active demonstration of his amazing technology.

"Needless to say, if we don't hear any response from his creation, I think a small whack with my ruler might be appropriate."

I was then forced to repeatedly yell, "Calling all cars!" This was followed by a sharp rap across the knuckles, as my request was greeted with silence.

Thus ended my enthusiasm for imaginary Dick Tracy talking watches - that is, until today, when I rang the caregiver on an Apple Watch and she responded with a short grocery list.

Shame it has all come 70 years too late to placate my woodwork teacher.