White Bear Lake is a city in Ramsey County in the state of Minnesota, United States. A little portion of the city also extends into Washington County. The population was 23,769 at the 2010 census. The city is located upon White Bear Lake, one of the largest lakes in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area.

The city is named after its largest lake, White Bear Lake. American writers have delivered differing versions of the legend that explains the lineage of the name. In her book Indian Legends of Minnesota, Mrs. Carl T. Thayer writes that “It is said that a Sioux maiden fell in love with a Chippewa brave. She, the daughter of the Chief, on learning that her father planned war adjoining the Chippewa, ran to her lover and warned him. The brave went alone into the Sioux village to ask for peace and the hand of the maiden. Before the Chief would agree, the Chippewa would have to attain a brave deed.”

“The lovers usually met on Manitou Island. One day, as the brave approached the Island, anticipating a meeting subsequently his beloved, he saw, to his horror, a great white bear attacking her. He dashed to her rescue. Freed, she ran to gain help from her father and the new Sioux. Returning, they proverb the brave sink his knife into the bear. But too late, they both fell to the ring dead. Slowly, as they watched, the spirits of the brave and the bear rose from their prone bodies. It is said that even today, as night falls, the spirits of the bear and the brave promenade the Island eternally in search of each other.”

In Mark Twain’s memoir Life upon the Mississippi, he offers a swap ending, relaying that “… the warrior, with one plunge of the blade of his knife, opened the crimson sluices of death, and the dying bear relaxed his hold. “That night, there was no more sleep for the band or the lovers, and as the pubescent and the archaic danced very nearly the carcass of the dead monster, the gallant warrior was presented in the heavens of another plume, and ere another moon had set he had a living cherish added to his heart. Their children for many years played on the skin of the white bear – from which the lake derives its name, and the maiden and the brave remembered long the terrified scene and rescue that made them one, for Kis-se-me-pa and Ka-go-ga could never forget their fearful clash with the big monster that came so close sending them to the happy hunting ground.”