Throwback Thursday | Wham-O Crazy South Pas

South Pasadena boasts having a Wham-O factory and the co-inventor of the pro model Frisbee and Father of Disc Golf

PHOTO: Rick Thomas | SouthPasadenan.com News | Oak Grove Disc Golf Course Park, Pasadena

The slingshot was manufactured in South Pasadena by Wham-O.

The Wham-O freestyle Frisbee also had historical roots here. The co-inventor of the pro model Frisbee, “Steady” Ed Headrick, was born and grew up in South Pasadena.

PHOTO: Rick Thomas Collection | SouthPasadenan.com News | The WHAM-O Sportsman slingshot, South Pasadena

Headrick also invented the sport of disc golf and personally installed Oak Grove Disc Golf Course for the 1975 World Frisbee Championship.

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Note: The nearby Oak Grove (Hahamongna Park) disc golf course is the first to use “pole holes” (poles and baskets).

PHOTO: Professional Disc Golf Association (PDGA) | SouthPasadenan.com News | Father of Disc Golf, “Steady” Ed Headrick, stands beside his “pole hole.”

Throwback Thursday is written and produced by Rick Thomas

 


Rick Thomas
Author Rick Thomas is the former museum curator and vice-chair of education for the South Pasadena Preservation Foundation. He served on the South Pasadena Natural Resources Commission, helping to maintain a strict policy protecting the city’s great old-growth trees. Using touchstone photographs from his own collection—one of the San Gabriel Valley’s largest accumulations of historical images and artifacts—as well as national, state, and local historical archives, Thomas provides a window to his city’s past and an understanding of why its preservation is so important.

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