Place

Since Minnesota is not a noted home to the polar bear, one might wonder where the name White Bear Lake comes from. If you believe Mark Twain, it originated with an Indian legend. In his 1883 book, “Life on the Mississippi,” he tells of a Romeo and Juliet type romance between a Sioux maiden and a Chippewa brave. Because the lovers were from quarreling tribes, the story goes, they met secretly on an island in the lake, soon to be known as White Bear Lake. One day, as the brave approached in his canoe, he saw a giant white bear (perhaps an albino) mauling his girlfriend. He rushed to her rescue. “The warrior, with one plunge of the blade of his knife, opened the crimson sluices of death,” wrote Twain, “and the dying bear relaxed his hold.”

So impressed was the maiden’s father with the brave’s deed, that he gave the couple his blessing, and they lived happily ever after with the white bearskin on the floor of their home. The lake, the island, and the town-to-be, on the other hand, would be haunted by the bear’s spirit for all eternity. That’s why the legendary island is named Manitou, which translates from Ojibwa to mean “great spirit.” Sometimes, if you drive down County Road F, the bear can be spotted still, holding a Chevy sign in front of Polar Chevrolet/Mazda. It also occasionally appears as an ornament on neighborhood lawns.

As with many lakeside towns, White Bear Lake had its turn as a fashionable resort community in the late nineteenth century. But then, in the 1890s, the town fell out of favor with the leisure class and an anchored community sprang up. Rows of century-old mansions—once summer homes—still tower above the lakeshore, lending the city an air of import. Just twenty miles north of St. Paul, White Bear Lake has its share of stripmalls, fast food joints, and auto dealerships. But near the lake itself, there is still an old-fashioned, clustered downtown that’s quite pleasant. Next to such precious shops as the Avalon Tearoom, where one can get a macaroon with her cream tea, many old buildings are left in their shabby splendor.

The architecture downtown ranges from Alsatian half-timbering to squat, seventies-era plazas crowned by cedar shake shingles. There are the requisite faux limestone storefronts, of course, but it’s not uncommon to see one-hundred-year-old tin buildings either. The business mix is similarly patch-worked. White Bear Lake has the Twin Cities’ only parrot shop, a Bikram yoga studio, and a store called Needlepoint Cottage. Fifty-year-old Ciresi’s Liquor Store shares its beat-up brownstone with a relatively new Christian bookshop. Boxy, old Hollihan’s Pub looks fortress-like with its dark green façade. The saloon sits kitty corner from Washington Square Bar and Grill, a stylish restaurant and bar housed in an airy, Frank Lloyd Wright-style structure with a low-pitched roof and floor-to-ceiling windows. Here, just as in the old days, we find quarrelling cultures shaking hands.—Christy DeSmith