New lessons at Johnson C. Smith University are discovered from real life hardships based in the Carolinas.
Pride comes from experiences largely rooted in pain.
The Courage exhibit, which proved to be a huge hit for Center City's Levine Museum of the New South, and has toured both nationally and internationally now has a new permanent home inside of James B. Duke Memorial on the Smith Campus.
Joe Delaine lived the story that's being told.
"I have been to most of the exhibits that have occurred here in the U.S.," he said.
The exhibit showcases the abject brutality endured by the Joe Delaine's family in Clarendon County South Carolina during the 1950's.
His father Reverend J.A. Delaine was among the community organizers who was on the ground floor during the landmark Supreme Court case that would come to be known as Brown vs. Board of Education that insured equality in our nation's classrooms.
Delaine said, "my mind has been opened up to the fact that there are so many insularly things that relate more appropriately to present generations that this can encourage them to understand and see."
Seeing how members of the Delaine family were burned out of their South Carolina home by those fanning the toxic flames of hatred offers an in your face example to Smith students.
Jordan Lewis is a JCSU student who toured the exhibit.
"I see this is a struggle we all had to get through. The civil rights movement was a big movement in that era, and that helped us," Lewis said.
The fact that the Courage exhibit would end up at JCSU is perhaps a twist of fate.
More than 50 years ago, Reverend Delaine's son B.B. would lead the student sit in movement of the 1960's.
He died this past summer.
Emily Zimmern is the President Levine Museum of the New South
"We think the courage exhibit is a fitting memorial to B.B. DeLaine."
Back in 2004, the late Reverend Delaine was honored with the congressional gold medal.
Meanwhile, those connected to the new home hope the panels will offer examples in perseverance.
Dr. Ronald Carter is the President of Johnson C. Smith University who calls the exhibit a valuable teaching tool.
"We will have a number of programs that will come from this exhibit, and one major program is the Center for moral courage," Carter said.
