On Sunday, over the state house in Columbia, South Carolina, the American flag flew at half staff.

Governor Henry McMaster ordered the gesture, in honor of someone he called, quote,

a truly extraordinary son of South Carolina. Chadwick Boseman.

You know, I'm from Anderson, South Carolina.

The 43-year-old actor died Friday, he battled with colon cancer for the past four years.

Boseman told NPR back in 2017 he remembered a different flag flying when he was a kid.

I know what it is to ride the school and have Confederate flags flying from trucks in front of me

and behind me to see a parking lot full of people with Confederate flags and know what that means.

I've been stopped by police for no reason. I've been called boy and nigger and everything else

that you could imagine. And so I understand what it is to to exist in that space and find your manhood.

A lot has been written about Boseman's path to Marvel's Black Panther,

playing Thurgood Marshall, James Brown, Jackie Robinson, and you've heard about what seeing him

in those roles meant to so many people. Consider this, what did it take for Chadwick Boseman to go

from that school bus in South Carolina to joining the ranks of the biggest movie stars of the past decade?

And what is it meant for Hollywood?

From NPR News, I'm Audie Cornish, it's Monday, August 31st.

Back in 1998, nine theater students from Howard University were accepted to a prestigious summer

program at the British Academy of Dramatic Acting in the UK. One of those students was Chadwick

Boseman and he and some of his fellow students needed help covering tuition.

So one of their professors at Howard, Cosby Show Actress Felicia Rashad was determined to help them

and she called up a friend. I'm going to screw this story up, but Felicia Rashad was helping kids

and she called different people and she called me and I said, the out sponsor wherever.

...