Card 59 - Inventors

The Frisbee

The first people to play with a Frisbee were college students at Yale. A local pie maker named William Frisbie used to make a very popular pie in Connecticut in the 1870s. After eating the pies, Yale students would throw the pie tins and watch them glide through the air.

In the 1950s, science fiction movies that showed UFOs (unidentified flying objects) invading a helpless Earth were very popular. On October 30, 1938, Orson Wells had sent thousands of people screaming into the streets during his fictional radio broadcast about invaders from outer space called "War of the Worlds." Many listeners that night didn't hear the part of Wells's show were he said it was just a story.

Walter Frederick of California made a toy UFO. Frederick's toy UFO was a disc that would glide through the air just like Frisbie's pie tins.

The Wham-O Company bought Frederick's idea in 1957. After learning of the Yale students' hobby of throwing Frisbie's pie tins around, Wham-O's executives found the perfect name for their new toy - the Frisbee.