Squirrels on Banks

So this past weekend we went to the Brooklyn Flea Market. I enjoy flea markets because I just love looking at all the old random stuff. I never buy anything. But where else could you find the guide to the USSR's pavilion at the 1934 World's Fair or postcards from 1942? That's the kind of stuff I enjoy.

We also went to this flea market because during the winter months it's held indoors, in the Williamsburgh Savings Bank, a landmark now turned to condos. The market is in the main hall and the food vendors are downstairs in the vault. It's a very cool setting for a flea market.

So of course I was there to try to find squirrel items, because that's pretty much what I'm always doing. The flea market disappointed me; not one squirrel was to be found there. The bank, however, had many!

Some of you loyal readers will think that this squirrel looks awfully familiar, and the rest of you will scroll down the rest of the way on the page (unless you're on Google Reader, in which case you are lame) and note that I found a squirrel almost exactly like this on an old bank in Manhattan just last week.

And that wasn't the only squirrel! There was also a squirrel in the interior, right in the staircase!

So has anyone else ever noticed that squirrels frequently make an appearance in the sculptural program on banks? It makes sense, since they are the savers of the animal world, but I still think it's a little weird. I did some googling about this and couldn't find anything on the Internet about it. I'm going to have to look for more examples of this phenomenon. Maybe I'll start up a catalogue or something and become the renowned expert on squirrels in sculpture.