The flying disk, a fixture at American beaches, parks, backyards and college campuses, was first developed independently on the East and West Coasts during the 1940s and 50s.
The tradition of throwing disks for play or sport extends from ancient Greece to the modern Olympics. However, in the 1940s, students at Yale University unintentionally put a twist on this tradition: they distracted themselves between classes by tossing around the shallow tin platters in which the popular pies of the nearby William R. Frisbie bakery were sold. The fad soon spread to other New England schools.
Meanwhile, in the 1950s, Walter F. Morrison of southern California created a toy disk that would fly and hover like the alien spacecraft made popular by Hollywood at that time. Soon after switching from metal to plastic material, Morrison reached an agreement with the Wham-O Company to produce and distribute these "Flyin' Saucers" (1957), which were an instant success locally.
The next year, Wham-O's president, Richard Knerr, made a marketing tour of the East coast. He was amazed to find Harvard and Yale students already playing with their own disks, namely the pie-pans they called "Frisbies." Knerr distributed his own improved disks and borrowed the name, which he trademarked as "Frisbee" without knowing what it meant (1959).
Since the 1960s, disks have given rise to a series of formal sports and international associations. The most popular of these sports is Ultimate, created by Joel Silver of New Jersey in 1967; its first World Championship was held in Sweden in 1983. Disks themselves have also developed: for example, the 13 inch Aerobie® ring created by a Stanford University engineer is registered as "the world's farthest thrown object," at 1,257 feet (1985). For casual pastime or competitive sport, Frisbees® and other flying disks will always be a mainstay of outdoor activity.
Source: The Lemelson-MIT Award Program's Invention Dimension