Who is Belinda Hayden from Ice Hunt and what is their importance?

Belinda is Bennie's wife and the obvious love of his life. She is a decade younger than her husband, but has a maturity and the incredible intelligence that easily spans the gap of time. She and her entire family are native to Kaktovik although her parents made a brief move to Fairbanks when she was in her teens. Like many Inuit natives and Indians, they were anxious for their share of the wealth of the black gold rush that was just in its beginning then, abandoning their homes and customs for the promise of wealth. Instead, they found pollution, and corruption of many kinds. Belinda had become a hooker to support her family at the young age of sixteen, but she met Bennie after her first arrest. He showed her another life in the sky and eventually they married and moved back to Kaktovik with her parents in tow.