Appling Mindlin's theory of thick plates and Hamilton system to propagation of elastic waves under free boundary condition, a solution of the problem was given. Dispersion equations of propagation mode of strip plates were deduced from eigenfunction expansion method. It was compared with the dispersion relation that was gained through solution of thick plate theory proposed by Mindlin. Based on the two kinds of theories, the dispersion curves show great difference in the region of short waves, and the cutoff frequencies are higher in Hamiltonian systems. However, the dispersion curves are almost the same in the region of long waves.