Walter Frederick Morrison

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Walter Fredrick Morrison is best known as the inventor of the Frisbee. He was born in Richfield, Utah. He currently resides in Monroe, Utah. There is a Disc Golf course named in his honor located in Holladay, Utah.

He claims that the original idea came to him from throwing a popcorn can lid with his girlfriend, Lu, whom he later married. The popcorn lid soon dented which led to the discovery that cake pans flew better and were more common. The two of them developed a little business selling "Flyin' Cake Pans" on the beaches of Santa Monica, CA. During World War II he learned something of aeronautics flying fighter-bombers in Italy. He was shot down and was a POW at the infamous Stalag 13. In 1946 he sketched out a design for the world's first flying disc. In 1948 he involved an investor, Warren Franscioni, who paid for molding his design out of plastic. In 1957 he sold the rights for his refined plastic flying disc to the Wham-O toy company. It was initially marketed by Wham-O as the "Pluto Platter", and in 1958 a modified version was renamed Frisbee, a (probably deliberate) misspelling of the name of the Frisbie Pie Company.

He has recently written an autobiography entitled Flat Flip Flies Straight, coauthored with disc historian and collector Phil Kennedy.