For those who gave their lives to keep our country safe, we owe them a debt that often can’t be repaid.

And as time moves forward, there are fewer and fewer people that show up to gravesites. Sadly, that can even be the case for more recent battles.

So when a 19-year-old went to visit the grave of a neighbor, he was shocked when he saw the dirty and stained headstones for the deceased veterans. He decided then and there he would fix that.

The soldiers were from recent conflicts and as far back as the Civil War.

“They gave their lives to serve this country, and I feel that needs to be honored,” Aaron Schultz said.

So the Iowa teen devised a plan to clean the graves and headstones. “People think, ‘Oh this person died in 1965, so his headstone should be dirty,’ ” he said.

But there’s a way to clean it off and preserve it to what it was.”

After spending some time online, Schultz discovered what he would need to clean the headstones.

Madonna White and Aaron Schultz plant American flags near each cleaned headstone. Photo by KGAN TV

He bought a special cleaning solution that is used at Arlington National Cemetery, along with scrapers that can be used to take off mold and lichen, which is a plantlike organism that forms on rocks, walls and trees.

After he posted his work on social media groups that were dedicated to restoring old headstones, a local Iowa City resident took notice and contacted him. 

Madonna White, 67, had family members in the military, just like Schultz.

“I was moved by the fact that he had felt that strongly about this,” she said. So she and Schultz decided to work on the graves together, and soon a friendship developed between the unlikely duo.

Together they have restored more than 100 headstones.

We’re gonna work on these veterans’ stones until we get them all,” White said.

They keep an eye out for certain stones because they’re here for a specific purpose – to pay it forward to those who served.

“He’s very good at spotting them, from a distance,” White said. “‘There’s one, there’s one, there’s one.”’

“Not all these veterans died during conflict,” she said. “They all served our country, that’s just what’s so cool about each of them getting a headstone.”

Madonna White and Aaron Schultz work to clean the headstones. Photo by KGAN TV

After the headstones are cleaned, they still don’t consider them done, until they do one final thing.

They stick a fresh American flag to the side of the headstone.

Schultz said he knows that some people don’t want to spend their time at cemeteries, but for him it’s a place where he can gain a new perspective on the past.

“I think it’s a great place to learn about the history of humanity and where you live,” he said. “The people that lived here before you, they were just like us.”

For a look at Schultz and White at work, watch below.

Sources: CBS2 | 3NewsNow | Reader’s Digest