Whilst researching the huge amount of information required to decipher the perk chart, I have made a shocking discovery.

Right at the start of the tutorial, we see our couple getting ready if front of the mirror, and the wife says "You're gonna knock 'em dead at the Veteran's Hall tonight Hun." Also, if we look at the http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--TDzk0L79--/c_fit,fl_progressive,q_80,w_636/1993h06hw9hg8png.png that the husband is supposed to read, as leaked to Kotaku way back at 2013, we can see that it mentions the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Next look at http://www.nature.com/news/history-from-blackboards-to-bombs-1.18056 article, showing an image of members of the US Army attending a lecture at the Department of Physics of M.I.T in 1944, in the build up to the Manhattan Project. Finally, look at http://www.mitsloanveterans.com/ webpage, regarding a veteran's association, and especially note the location.

What this suggests, in no uncertain terms, is that on the day of the great war, our couple were on their way to the Institute.

Well yes, I would imagine that would be the place the veteran's hall meeting would be arranged. A big important place like the Institute? Who wouldn't want a big important meeting there?

Also, reading that speech makes me think, 'Does Howard want to stir up controversy? Given the political climate of the day and they are likely there to commemorate the veterans of Anchorage and other wars, is he really that anxious to start a controversy by saying all that?' Damn, Howard...

Which means that the location they were meant to go to for the meeting also ties in with the later disappearance of the protagonist's family.

Hmm...I had not considered this. Interesting connection.

Was the Institute the Institute back then or was it just MIT, by this mean was the Institute like the Enclave a secret pre war group that survived the Great War or did the Institute form from the survivors of MIT after the war.

I have a feeling that the Institute was actually a secret organisation within M.I.T. set up by the Enclave, or the Shadow Government as they were known at the time. And so there could actually be more to the story than we first realised. If the Great War hadn't have happened, who knows what our protagonist couple could have ended up being dragged into.

The Institute being a pre war organisation (with Enclave ties perhaps) could explain how they have managed to jump so far ahead tech wise, since they could have been working on Snyth Technologhy uninterrupted by the destruction inside their probable bunker/vault.

I do wonder if the use of synths as manual labour and security could have been a long plan to allow the establishment of an elite scientific community with a human like android underclass. It would seem to explain why they spent so much time and effort to replace robots who were already filling those roles in the pre-war USA. I mean why take the time and effort to make humanoid robots when the tech to make ordinary robots who can already fulfill those requirements already existed.

I also wonder if the eventual aim was to make an android that could be used to replace humans all together, downloading the Institute members into an Immortal form.

So in a nut shell, you're saying that the protagonist and family were part of a secret plot involving both the Institute and Vault Tec?

I think they were caught up in something very big, that they had no idea about, and that will end up having repercussions on the main story over 200 years later!

What's really odd is if you now go back and read http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1520864-fallout-4-tutorial-theory/?p=24038504, which I posted a couple of hours before the E3 showcase. Of particular note is the first paragraph after the two links...