[3][4] On October 10, 2001, shortly before her death from aplastic anemia at the age of 68, she received the Presidential Rank Meritorious Award.

Her mother's father, Alex Christian, was known as Pic Ah Kelowna, "White Grizzly Bear"; her great uncle (brother of her maternal grandmother) was Chief James Bernard, a Sin Aikst leader in the early 20th century.

[8] Her parents separated in 1939 and subsequently divorced;[9] her mother would later work again for Wong in Tacoma, Washington, and eventually marry him.

[10] From 1940 to 1942, Reyes and her older brother Lawney were students at the Chemawa Indian School five miles north of Salem, Oregon[11] After graduating at the head of her class[12] from Okanogan High School (Okanogan, Washington) in 1951, she moved to Tacoma, Washington, living with her mother, working in a department store and for Harry Wong's restaurant.

[13] Reyes' brother, Bernie Whitebear (1937–2000), was a prominent activist, not only founder of SIHB, but co-founder of the United Indians of All Tribes Foundation, and the Daybreak Star Cultural Center; her older brother Lawney Reyes is a sculptor, designer, curator, and memoirist.