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An American Toy Company Produced the World’s First Frisbees on This Day in 1957
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January 23, 2025
The flying disc had humble beginnings but has since become an international phenomenon
Travel Correspondent
January 23, 2025
When Wham-O Manufacturing Co. rolled out its first flying discs on January 23, 1957, there must have been some speculation: Would the idea fly with consumers?
But 68 years later, hundreds of millions of Frisbees—aerodynamic plastic discs that are typically about eight to ten inches in diameter and feature a curved lip, creating a lift force that helps them soar through the air—have been sold worldwide.
American inventor Walter Frederick Morrison came up with the idea for what would later become Frisbees in the late 1930s while tossing the lid of a popcorn tin back and forth with his future wife, Lucile. Once the tin wore out, the couple started tossing a cake pan instead. Someone noticed the two of them having fun with their makeshift toy and offered the pair 25 cents (equivalent to between $5 and $6 today) to purchase it.
“That got the wheels turning,” Morrison later told a reporter for the Virginian-Pilot, “because you could buy a cake pan for five cents, and if people on the beach were willing to pay a quarter for it, well—there was a business.”
Morrison started selling his “Flyin’ Cake Pans” along Southern California’s beaches and parks, but his business screeched to a halt during World War II, when the inventor flew P-47 fighter-bombers and was briefly imprisoned in Europe. Upon his return, he continuously refined his flying disc.
First there was the “Whirlo-Way,” a design Morrison named in honor of the 1941 Triple Crown winning racehorse, Whirlaway. Then in 1947, Morrison met investor Warren Franscioni. Together they created the Flyin Saucer, a name meant to cash in on a growing craze for unidentified flying objects (UFOs). The two had their toy molded in plastic, allowing it to fly farther and with more accuracy than the previous tin pie plates. However, Morrison and Franscioni went their separate ways in 1950 after disappointing sales.
Still, Morrison kept at it, eventually creating the “archetype for the modern plastic flying disc,” the Pluto Platter. Aerodynamically superior to previous versions, this mass-produced plastic disc was also the first to have a UFO-influenced cupola on top. It caught the attention of Wham-O, a toy company known for the wildly popular Hula-Hoop, and in 1957, Morrison granted them full control of the Pluto Platter’s manufacturing and marketing in exchange for royalties.
Soon after the first Pluto Platters were introduced, Wham-O discovered that New England students had been tossing empty pie tins from Connecticut’s Frisbie Pie Company back-and-forth, a habit that led them to refer to Pluto Platters as “Frisbies.” Wham-O liked the nickname and renamed their disc “Frisbee,” altering the spelling to avoid copyright infringement.
Though sales of Frisbees remained steady, it wasn’t until Wham-O hired toy inventor Ed Headrick in 1964 as head of research and development that the flying disc really took off. He patented the design for today’s Frisbee in 1967, adding a band of raised ridges on its surface for a better thumb grip. Headrick then began marketing Frisbee as a sport.
Soon after, a group of Maplewood, New Jersey, high school students invented Ultimate Frisbee, a game that includes elements of American football, basketball and soccer. Headrick himself came up with the idea for disc golf, in which players toss flying discs into metal baskets. Canines love Frisbees, too: Originating in the 1970s, Disc Dog (often called Frisbee Dog) is a fast-paced game that lets dogs and their human disc throwers compete in a variety of events together.
Although Mattel Toy Manufacturers bought the official Frisbee from Wham-O in 1994, it's still flying off the assembly lines today. In 1998, the Frisbee was even inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame.
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