A zoologist at Yale. A. E. Verrill catalogued the giant squid of the 1870s for the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences. He reprinted the Thimble Tickle letter of 1878 as specimen No. 18 and accepted it as an Architeuthis. He also filed the Dingle beast of 1673 under Architeuthis monachus. Then came the St. Augustine Monster of 1896. Verrill called it a true Octopus of colossal size and, in February 1897, named it Octopus giganteus. In March 1897, after tissue samples arrived, he reversed course. He judged it cetacean, perhaps part of a sperm whale's head.
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