(2Q-2026) Economist Friedrich A. Hayek (1899-1992) taught at the Univ. of Arkansas (1949-50) and was later co-recipient of the 1974 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel in Sweden. Walter Morris (1912-1999) was a noted Wall Street investor who moved to Arkansas. (1)

Morris and Hayek understood flawed monetary structures can destabilize societies through inflation and deflation. Their private correspondence reveals they were deeply troubled by events of the 1970s, when U.S. inflation rates hit an annualized rate of 7.1%, a 20th Century decadal peak. They would be troubled by the reemergence of inflation in the third decade of the 21st Century.

The Nobel Economist: Friedrich Hayek

Friedrich August Hayek was born in Vienna. He served in an artillery regiment of the Austro-Hungarian Army in World War I and fought on the Italian front. Post-war, Hayek earned doctorates in law and political science in 1921 and 1923 at the Univ. of Vienna. He founded and led the Austrian Institute for Business Cycle Research before joining the London School of Economics in 1931.  Nazi Germany invaded Austria in the Anschluss in 1938, leading Hayek to become a British subject. He later lived in the United States, Austria and West Germany.

Hayek was co-recipient of the 1974 prize for “pioneering work in the theory of money and economic fluctuations” and for “penetrating analysis of the interdependence of economic, social and institutional phenomena.” The Nobel committee observed:

“Economic issues affect almost every area of society and economic science also interplays with other social sciences. In the 1920s, Friedrich von Hayek conducted important work on business cycles, but later developed broader social analyses. From the 1930s, he highlighted the problems of central economic planning. His conclusion was that knowledge and information held by various actors can only be utilized fully in a decentralized market system with free competition and pricing.” (2)

Hayek was featured with his contemporary, John Maynard Keynes, in the 2002 PBS documentary, ‘Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy.’

The Arkansas Investor: Walter Morris

Walter Scott Morris was a New Jersey native, WWII veteran, and Wall Street investor who relocated to Arkansas. He read widely and was interested in ideas.

He developed a friendship with Hayek and, through vision and sheer force of will, ensured the Nobel winner’s work was preserved for future generations.  It is largely due to Morris’ generosity that Hayek’s work is accessible in a multi-volume Univ. of Chicago Press series. (3) Chicago was a profound choice: 32 economists associated at some point with the school have won the prize.

To ensure The Collected Works of F.A. Hayek were published, Morris had to develop a vision and overcome obstacles including finding editors. Stephen Kresge describes this process in the editorial foreword to Vol. 6 (Good Money: Part II):

“The initial impulse came from Walter Morris, who attended the keynote address given by Hayek (at a New York event) in 1982.  Morris was an admirer of Benjamin Graham, whose book Storage and Stability was one of the sources of Hayek’s essay. In what was to be only the first of many acts of generosity, Morris then brought together, at a dinner party in honor of Hayek, W.W. Bartley III; Irving Kahn, who has recently seen Graham’s (book) back into print; and, among others, this editor … In the following year, Walter Morris supplied the enthusiasm, good will, and persistence that convinced Hayek and Bartley that a collected work must be produced to acquaint the present generation with Hayek’s thinking and to preserve for future generations a legacy which we can now see is nothing less than an introduction to the development of the modern world.”

Bartley was a California philosopher and the first volume’s editor. He died of cancer in 1990, leading Kresge to assume the role of general editor. Bruce J. Caldwell, an economic historian, later took on the position, with support from the Morris Foundation. Caldwell later wrote two biographies of F.A. Hayek. (4)

–Greg Kaza

References

(1) Walter Morris’s widow is Dorothy Morris, a Policy Foundation board member.

(2) https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/1974/hayek/facts/

(3) https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/series/CWFAH.html

(4) https://sites.duke.edu/brucecaldwell/