4 December
1998: On 4 December 1988, the 13th flight of the Space Shuttle Endeavour was launched.
The mission, codenamed STS-88, began the largest international cooperative space venture in history as it attached together in orbit the first two modules of the International Space Station (ISS).
The primary mission objective was to rendezvous with the already-launched 'Zarya' Control Module and successfully attach the 'Unity Node', providing the foundation for future station components.
'Zarya' had been launched into orbit by a Russian Proton rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
1131: On 4 December 1131, Omar Khayyam, a Persian astronomer, mathematician and poet died.
Born in Nishapur on 18 May 1048, Khayyam produced a work on algebra that was used as a textbook in Iran until the twentieth century. Around 1074, he set up an observatory and led work on compiling astronomical tables. He also contributed to the reform of the Persian calendar.
1574: On 4 December 1574, Georg Joachim Rheticus died.
Rheticus was an Austrian-born astronomer and mathematician who was among the first to adopt and spread the theory of Nicolaus Copernicus that Earth orbited the Sun. Copernicus asked for his friend's aid in editing his De revolutionibus orbium coelestium ('On the revolutions of the heavenly spheres').
