[1] The community is approximately 55 mi (89 km) northwest of Swift Current on the north side of the South Saskatchewan River.

[2] The community's name comes from the sighting of a probable but now extirpated white prairie grizzly bear by an Assiniboine warrior on the shores of a neighbouring lake during the Palliser Expedition of the 1850s.

Records from early Metis settlers and the North-West Mounted Police state the last roaming herd of American buffalo being slaughtered in the hills of the Missouri Coteau located 25 miles (40 km) northeast around 1879.

During the 1930s, White Bear was a bustling community of approximately 250 residents with two grocery stores, a school, four grain elevators and three garages servicing an area of 200 families, but has since dwindled to a population of 15 in 2006.

Part of the decline is attributed to federal policy Canadian National Railway rail line in that area of Saskatchewan.