Based on the way the car died, I had a hunch that the problem was in the fuel delivery. Power more or less faded away with little gasps of normal power here and there. So I started with taking a fuel pressure reading and found out it was only providing about 13 psi of pressure. I swapped out the fuel filter with no change and also the fuel pump, again with no change. The only thing left was a fuel shortage or a blockage between the filter and the tank. I added some fuel and after many cranks, it fired up, a little ragged at first and then stronger after 15 - 20 seconds. I had run out of fuel.
When asking myself why, I discovered that my fuel gauge was nonfunctional. I realized then that I had the habit of subconsciously noting only whether the gauge was in the red when scanning my instrument panel instead of a defined level (full, half, 1/4, etc.). With no needle visible, I had scanned right over it.
I checked out the wiring to the gauge and found a flaw. As you had assigned for homework, I wired up a piggyback at the fuel guage to connect the base plate of the alternator/turn signal lamps, the base plate of the oil pressure lamp, and the fuel gauge into one electrical loop. However we didn't have it quite right to start, the brown wire with the black tracer was wired to the vibrator. Consulting the wiring diagram, I discovered that the gauge (double black wires) and vibrator (brown w/black tracer) needed to be swapped so that the double black wires were on the vibrator and the brown/black was on the gauge. Made that switch but my gauge remains dead at this time. Maybe it got cooked by having full 12v all the time and nothing from the vibrator?
Further investigation to come tomorrow.