Batch Insert tables

    I'm experimenting with postgres with postgis for use with
mapserver.  I have loaded approximately 650 shapefiles into postgres,
each as a separate table.  The name of each table is a unique identifier
for as species.  Each represents a species distribution and may consist
of one or more polygons.  What I would like to do is combine the 650
tables into a single table (Preferably without reloading them into
postgres with shp2pgsql).  The complication is that I need to add a
column to each of the tables that incorporates the name of the table as
a unique identifier before merging the tables.  Is their an easy way to
do this in postgres( 7.4) ???  Maybe I don't need to do this, but it
seems like the easiest way to set the database up (for the schema I have
in mind).