Father of the Frisbee Dies At 90

theodp writes "Walter Fredrick Morrison, whose post-World War II invention of a 'flying' plastic disc became the American recreational icon known as the Frisbee, has died at age 90 of age-related causes (great obit pic). Wham-O Inc. has sold more than 200 million Frisbees since Morrison sold the company the rights to what he called the Pluto Platter in 1957. The roots of today's aerodynamic Frisbees go back to 1937, when Morrison and his future wife tossed a large popcorn can lid back and forth for fun during a Thanksgiving party."

Comments

Re:Not accurate

[Graff]

I seem to recall watching a documentary that showed the frisbee being invented some time back in 1885 or 1886.

The Frisbie was originally the pie plate used by the Frisbie Pie Company to bake and sell its pies in. Yale students were throwing them around in games since the late 1800's, well before Fred Morrison came up with his "Pluto Platter". Wham-O decided to re-name the Pluto Platter to the Frisbie because that's what it was already widely called, then they had to re-name it again to "Frisbee" in order to avoid trademark infringement.