Roger Worrall's late father Irvine Lenz didn't talk much about his experiences in the Second World War.
"He was in England and France, and then he was involved in liberating Holland," Worrall recalled.
"There was a couple of times when he opened up a little bit. He told me he saw his friends shot right beside him in the line of duty. It was very, very emotional."
Worrall, a scout leader with the Langley Mavericks troop, was talking about the annual cleanup of the veterans headstones at the Murrayville cemetery, in advance of the Remembrance Day service.
"I've brought my dad's medals out to show the kids when we do the cleanup, to show them what he earned and what he fought for," Worrall said.
This year, Mavericks scouter Alexis Parks predicted, there would be enough kids to tend to some of the non-veteran headstones at the cemetery as well.
"We have a huge amount of people now, more than ever, to expand [the cleaning to] more than just the headstones of the veterans, but also some of the other headstones that don't get sometimes as as much of a cleaning that they very well deserve," Parks told the Langley Advance Times.
As before, scouts will bring "buckets and soap and scrubbers, and they get down on their hands and knees and and scrub those, those headstones," Parks said.
"My grandfather was part of the Korean war. So to me, it's been a thing that I've wanted to do [for a long time]," Parks said.
At the Fort Langley cemetery, since 2017, scouts and guides have been coming to show their respect for veterans by cleaning headstones.
For 2024, Colleen Campbell of the First Walnut Grove troop, was anticipating a big turnout.
"We've got scouts and Girl Guides participating, and there's nine different groups, and it looks like about close to 50 kids," Campbell estimated.
"Personally, I just think it's important to recognize all the veterans for everything that they've done for everyone," Campbell said.
"And I just feel that, as the years go on, more and more people are just forgetting what happened. So I think it's important that we still keep remembering."
Attending to the headstones is a way of making history real, Campbell believes.
"I think that's why [it's good to have] the kids coming in and doing that, because then they can see, 'oh, wow, look at that, look at all these people that are here.'"
READ ALSO: VIDEO: Scouts tend to veterans’ headstones at Murrayville cemetery
READ ALSO: VIDEO: Paying their respects
