His early childhood was spent largely on the Colville Indian Reservation in Washington. His parents separated in 1939 and subsequently divorced; his mother would later marry Harry Wong, with whom she and Bernie's father had run a Chinese restaurant in 1935-1937, during the construction of the Grand Coulee Dam. While his older brother Lawney Reyes and sister Luana Reyes went away to attend boarding school, Chemawa Indian School in 1940–1942, Bernard was too young to do so. He lived with foster grandparents, the Halls.