History books are filled with the stories of famous people whose exploits and achievements have influenced history, many of them men and women who helped build a better world.

But what about the unsung heroes of everyday life, the people who contributed in small, unheralded ways to their communities? How about the father or mother, never to be forgotten for all the little things they did to enrich their child’s life?

Taking a walk through your local cemetery surrounds you with markers commemorating the lives of these unsung heroes. They are the men and women of your community’s past, who might not be famous, but are still historic and sometimes legendary figures to friends and families.

Walking among the headstones is a tour of a community’s history. It is impossible to read the inscriptions and not wonder who a person was and what he or she was like in life.

The tombstones remind us that no matter how ordinary some people may appear to us, they are heroes to someone else.