Juan José Elhuyar, chemist & mineralogist born in Spain June 15, 1754
Co-discoverer of tungsten, Juan José Elhuyar was born June 15,1754 in Logroño, Spain.
In 1783, Spanish brothers Juan José and Fausto Elhuyar isolated tungsten in its pure form for the first time by reducing tungstic acid using charcoal. Thus, the Elhuyar brothers get official credit for discovering and isolating the element, which they called “wolfram” or “volfram.”
Discovery of Tungsten
Issued 1983 by Spain
… the brothers Fausto and Juan José D’Elhuyar achieved the isolation of tungsten, the only chemical element discovered in Spain and the first chemical element to be isolated in the world, without being directly extracted from nature, as it does not exist in free form without chemical combination. Fausto Fermín De Elhuyar (1755-1833) and Juan José De Elhuyar (1754-1796) were in charge of the ‘Laboratorium Chemicum’ of the Royal Basque Society of Friends of the Country: in their research, they started from wolframite (the generic name for a group of tungsten minerals such as iron tungstate or ferberite and manganese tungstate or hübnerite). By reduction with carbon, on September 28, 1783, they obtained the new metal, which they called volfram; currently known as tungsten.
https://basque.science/the-delhuyar-brothers-the-discovery-and-isolation-of-tungsten/
If that Stamp of the Day was too brief, we have 2 more, including a longer article on the 1st successful Atlantic crossing by airplane. It includes a few of my favourite photos and stamps.