March 24th
1494 Georgius Agricola, "Father of Minerology"; described mining and mellurgical processes, was born.
1711 William Brownrigg, first to describe platinum and use of pneumatic trough for collection of gases, was born.
1884 Peter Joseph William Debye, researcher in dipole moments and powder method of x-ray diffraction, was born. He won the Nobel Prize (1936) for his contributions to our knowledge of molecular structure through his investigations on dipole moments and on the diffraction of X-rays and electrons in gases.