During this period, Luhnow also increasingly took control of his uncle's charitable operations by directing more and more of the monies of the William Volker Fund to libertarian and conservative causes.
During the 1930s, Luhnow became an active opponent of Kansas City's Pendergast political machine,[2] and was exposed to libertarian thought through fellow reformer Loren Miller.
Miller introduced Luhnow to intellectual heavyweights and public figures who shared the businessmen's hostility to machine politics.
[3] As his familiarity with and commitment to liberal economic ideas grew, Luhnow began using more and more of his influence over his uncle's charitable fund to give sizable contributions to libertarian and conservative causes.
He "paid [Ludwig von] Mises's salary at New York University; he paid F. A. Hayek's salary at the University of Chicago; he funded lectures that Milton and Rose Friedman turned into Capitalism and Freedom and he approved the grant that enabled Murray Rothbard to write Man, Economy and State.