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The Origin of Frisbee

People have purchased more than 200 million Frisbees in the last 50 years, by some estimates. That's more than baseballs, footballs, and basketballs combined. It had a slow start, though.

People have thrown pie pans, paint can lids, and paper plates since they were invented. According to Victor Malafronte, a Frisbee historian, "The first plastic disc was that Flyin' Saucer in 1948." The Flyin' Saucer was invented by Walter Frederick Morrison and Warren Franscioni. Circumstance and distance forced the two founders to drift apart in the 50's, and Morrison developed another flying disk toy on the side - the Pluto Platter, which caused a rift that separated the 2 for good.

Morrison met Rich Knerr and Spud Melin, the founders of the toy comapny Wham-O in 1955. Morrison signed a contract with Wham-O, and Knerr showed his marketing exeprtise and discovered a new name for the toy.

Knerr was visiting East-coast colleges drumming up demand for the Pluto Platter when he encountered student at Yale tossing metal pie plates and yelling "Frisbie!" (the way golfers yell "Fore!")

That tradition has been traced back to a baker from Bridgeport, Connecticut, named William Russell Frisbie. In 1871 Frisbie managed the local branch of the Olds Baking Co. He eventually bought the bakery and renamed it Frisbie Pie Co.

Frisbee historian Malafronte believes truck drivers for the company were the first to toss Frisbie Pie tins on the loading docks during idle times. The tins bore the words "Frisbie's Pies" and had six small holes in the center, in a star pattern, that hummed when the tin flew.

The sport moved to Eastern colleges, where students shouted "Frisbie!" to warn people of incoming pie tins. A sport developed and took on the name "Frisbie-ing." Knerr took the word home to Wham-O, misspelled it "Frisbee," and registered it as a trademark. In 1958, Morrison's Pluto Platter became the Wham-O Frisbee.


Fred Morrison is credited with the invention of the Frisbee (or at the very least given top billign when Franscioni is given any credit). A fact that has tormented Franscioni's family and heirs.

Mattel, who bought Wham-O in 1994, dates the Frisbee's official birth at 1957, when Wham-O first marketed the Pluto Platter.

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