Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger declared Monday, Jan. 29, to be Milton Friedman Day in the State of California. The governor made the announcement on Jan. 22 at a private memorial service for the Nobel Prize-winning, Hoover Institution-affiliated economist.

The City of San Francisco, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and The Economist magazine also honored “Friedman Day,” according to a release from the Hoover Institution. The University of Chicago hosted a memorial service yesterday for the avid supporter of free markets.

“Schwarzenegger told those attending the tribute ceremony that he was inspired by Friedman and his ideas on the power of the free market while watching the [public] television program Free to Choose in the early 1980s,” the release said.

Friedman was a Senior Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution. He died on Nov. 16, 2006 at 94 and is survived by his wife Rose.