Many people don’t realize that bears are not a natural species in North America. They were introduced by a Shakespeare lover who felt that every animal mentioned in his plays should live in America. So he released two bears into Central Park in 1890. The two bred and soon there were millions of them, overrunning New York City. To save themselves, the survivors gathered in the southern tip of Manhattan and erected an improvised defensive wall to keep the bears out. The bears, unable to get at the people, turned away and migrated throughout the rest of the country. The survivors re-occupied the city and the site of their wall was named Wall Street.