The Photos

The events are in chronological order (this helps resolve some ambiguities, others can be resolved in following steps)

• March 13, 1610: Galileo's Sidereus Nuncius published
• Jan 17, 1706: Ben Franklin born
• Dec 17, 1903: Wright Brothers flight
• April 15, 1912: Titanic sinks
• Oct 4, 1957: Sputnik
• Oct 1, 1958: NASA opens (not the "founded" date, so some ambiguity here. In the next step the "founded" date gives an "X" which may help)
• May 7, 1966: Big Sail dedicated
• May 18, 1969: Apollo 10
• July 20, 1969: Armstrong walks on moon
• May 22, 1980: Pacman
• July 14, 1983: Mario Brothers
• April 20, 1993: Tewhey resigns
• Jan 26, 1997: Super Bowl 31
• March 23, 1998: Oscars Ceremony
• Jan 15, 2001: Wikipedia starts
• Aug 30, 2006: XKCD "Grownups"
• Oct 5, 2011: Steve Jobs dies
• Sept 14, 2015: Ahmed Mohammed takes clock to school

Calendar Letters, First Pass

These dates point to squares in the calendar pages. Take those to spell, in the above order:

NEEDS A TAD MORE LOCAL

The Local Tie-In

You now may imagine that some local happenings are associated with these events.

Since two of the events are MIT-specific your searches may lead you to encounter the information (or you might guess) that there have been MIT Hacks associated with each of the events.

Of course you then repeat the process of looking up the dates for the events.

• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2010/galileo_400th_anniversary/ March 16, 2010
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2008/ben_franklin_kites/ January 17, 2008
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2003/wright_flyer/ December 17, 2003
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/1998/techtanic/ September 12, 1998
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2007/sputnik/ October 4, 2007
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2008/nasa/ October 1, 2008
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/1996/smile_sail/ May 21, 1996
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2009/apollo_lander/ May 17, 2009
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/1999/moon_landing/ July 20, 1999
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2013/dome_pacman/ January 10, 2013
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2005/mario_bros/ December 14, 2005
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/1993/tewhey_tombstone/ May 8, 1993
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/1997/cheese/ January 27, 1997
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/1998/oscar_greenspeak/ March 24, 1998
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2011/wikipedia/ January 15, 2011
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2007/xkcd_playpen_balls/ May 14, 2007
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2011/apple_logo/ October 6, 2011
• http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/2015/ahmed_clock/ September 18, 2015

Calendar Letters, Second Pass

Sort the hack dates into chronological order (as the initial events were given). As you did before, take the letter for the hack date on the matching calendar page. This gives:

 May 8, 1993         = O
 May 21, 1996        = L
 January 27, 1997    = D
 March 24, 1998      = F
 September 12, 1998  = E
 July 20, 1999       = R
 December 17, 2003   = D
 December 14, 2005   = I
 May 14, 2007        = S
 October 4, 2007     = T
 January 17, 2008    = E
 October 1, 2008     = A
 May 17, 2009        = K
 March 16, 2010      = H
 January 15, 2011    = O
 October 6, 2011     = U
 January 10, 2013    = S
 September 18, 2015  = E

Given "OLD FERDI STEAKHOUSE", various MIT hacking histories will tell you that Ferdi, the fiberglass cow in the MIT Museum, was originally from a Hilltop Steakhouse.

So the answer is HILLTOP