“Tough times never last, but tough people do!” is the title of a 1983 book by Robert Harold Schuller.The book popularized the phrase, often slightly changed to “tough times don’t last, tough people do.” College football coach Rick Neuheisel has often used the phrase to motivate his players.
 
“Hard times make a hard people” is cited in print from 1892. Jack Johnson (1878-1946)—boxing’s “Galveston Giant”—was cited in print in 1969 for saying “Tough times make tough people.” The actor Gregory Peck (1916-2003) is sometimes quoted with a long paragraph that ends: “Tough times don’t last, tough people do.” The Peck quotation does not appear to have a source or a date.
   
 
Wikipedia: Jack Johnson (boxer)
Arthur John Johnson (March 31, 1878 – June 10, 1946), better known as Jack Johnson and nicknamed the “Galveston Giant”, was an American boxer and arguably the best heavyweight of his generation. He was the first black world heavyweight boxing champion (1908-1915). In a documentary about his life, Ken Burns notes: “For more than thirteen years, Jack Johnson was the most famous and the most notorious African-American on Earth.”
 
Wikipedia: Gregory Peck
Gregory Peck (April 5, 1916 – June 12, 2003) was an American film and stage actor. He was one of 20th Century Fox’s most popular film stars, from the 1940s to the 1960s, and played important roles well into the 1990s. One of his most notable performances was as Atticus Finch in the 1962 film version of To Kill a Mockingbird, for which he won his Academy Award. President Lyndon Johnson honored Peck with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1969 for his lifetime humanitarian efforts. In 1999, the American Film Institute named Peck among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time, ranking at #12.
 
Gregory Peck - BetterWorldHeroes.com
QUOTES
You have to dream, you have to have a vision and you have to set a goal for yourself that might even scare you a little at times because sometimes that seems far beyond your reach. Then I think you have to develop a kind of resistance to rejection, and to the disappointments that are sure to come your way. Tough times don’t last, tough people do…
 
3 April 1892, Ogden (UT) Standard, pg. 8, col. 2: 
“Hard times make a hard people.”
 
7 Narch 1943, Los Angeles (CA) Times, “Sportraits” by Al Wolf, pg. A8:
Hard times make hard people.
   
Google Books
Black Champion: The life and times of Jack Johnson
By Finis Farr
Published by Fawcett Publications
1969
Pg. 10:
All the boy would say was, “Tough times make tough people.”
   
Google Books
Freedomways
By Freedomways Associates
1969
Item notes: v. 9
Pg. 128:
When his parents reproached him (Boxing great Jack Johnson—ed.), all he would say was, “Tough times make tough people.”
   
OCLC WorldCat record
Tough times never last, but tough people do!
Author: Robert Harold Schuller
Publisher: Nashville : T. Nelson Publishers, ©1983.
Edition/Format: Book : English
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Tough times don’t last
Author: Ronnie Rogers
Publisher: Nashville, TN : MTM Records, 1987.
Edition/Format: Musical cassette : Country music : No Linguistic Content
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Tough times don’t last, tough people do! : descendants of Anton Henrich Büscher and Clara Marie Kneige Büscher
Author: Chuck Buescher
Publisher: Churubusco, Ind. : Buescher, 2000.
Edition/Format: Book : English
 
Zazzle.com
Tough times don’t last.
Tough people do.
Southeast TEXAS is
Tougher than Rita
Tougher than Ike
T-shirt by coachstarkie
Message stating Southeast Texas will not be beaten by Huricanes Rita and Ike.
created by coachstarkie (28/09/2008 07:28)
   
RehabCare
November 05, 2008
“Tough times don’t last, tough people do.”
That’s how Jim signs off on all his blog posts, and how true that quote is! 
     
Seattle (WA) Times
Rick Neuheisel’s sorry, but says he would have kept UW football strong
Coach Rick Neuheisel returns to the scene of his firing and resulting lawsuit as he brings UCLA to Washington for a game. He says he’s sorry it ended the way it did…
By Bob Condotta
Seattle Times staff reporter
(...)
He stays in touch with a few others — he said he got a text message from Reggie Williams after the Bruins beat Tennessee in his first game as UCLA’s coach, reciting one of Neuheisel’s favorite sayings that “tough times don’t last but tough people do.”