Become An Inventor

The Frisbee - Invention For All Ages

In any park or recreation area, you are likely to notice a frisbee. There is no telling of how long ago the first "flying disk" was thrown. In ancient times, the Romans and the Greeks competed in throwing stones. Maybe, one day, they found a flat stone disk and noticed that if flies further and with a predictable trajectory.

The story of the frisbee shows how an enthusiastic and motivated marketing man turned a local college fad into a full-fledged international sport played by millions of people.

The story took place in Bridgeport, Connecticut over one hundred years ago, where William Russell Frisbie owned the Frisbie Pie Company. While his sister baked the pies, William traveled around the local shops and sold them. Shortly after 1900, Joseph P. Frisbie took over the business and expanded his traveling routine to include some shops in New Haven, the home of Yale University.

Frisbie pies were quite popular at Yale. Not only did they come in numerous flavors, they always included a wide pie tin. At some unrecorded moment, it was discovered that with a firm flick of a wrist, the empty pie tins would, almost magically, glide through the air.

In a short time, this game of catch became a campus fad. Around 1940's, as plastics were emerging as a cheap and easily moldable material, the pie-tin was seen as a manufactureable product.

Today, the frisbee flies all over the world.

However, this is not where the story ends. This amazingly simple concept of the frisbee has unlimited potential for improvement. Let's examine one example, US patent 4894038, titled "Frisbee Disk and Ball Drop Assembly".

This invention relates to the field of amusement devices and games which utilize an item that is thrown through the air, and in particular to those which carry a second item that separates from the first during flight.

One of the requirements of inventing is being curious enough. You have passed the first test, so we are waiting for you to become an inventor.