Heard of Hayek?

Was talking with a friend and mentioned that I had heard that Hayek was an influential figure from the 20th Century. All I know was that some of the current economic thinking in ascendancy right now was advocated by Hayek when it was the minority view. Other than that I don't know anything about him. Recently in Postrel's blog, she mentioned a Hayek-centric web page.

Below is an excerpt from the PBS documentry on economics where some of the notibles are profiled.

excerpt:
As World War II progressed, Hayek became increasingly apprehensive about what he saw as the advance of collectivism, central planning, and what would become Keynesian interventionism. In one of his most famous articles, he argued that the problem of knowledge defeats central control of economies: Those at the center can never have enough information to make their decisions. Much better, he argued, was the price system, which, in "its real function" was "a mechanism for communicating information." For Hayek, it was nothing less than "a marvel." He explained, "The marvel is that in a case like that of a scarcity of one raw material, without an order being issued, without more than perhaps a handful of people knowing the cause, tens of thousands of people whose identity could not be ascertained by months of investigation, are made to use the material or its products more sparingly; that is, they move in the right direction."
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It was while at Chicago that Hayek wrote what many consider his outstanding work, The Constitution of Liberty, published in 1960. In it, he further developed one of his most important themes: Laissez-faire was not enough. Government did have a clear role: to ensure the development and maintenance of the institutions -- the laws and rules -- that would ensure a competitive economy.
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Now, I can see why Postrel, a ardent libertarian would be a fan of Hayek.