Teen's Desert Storm war memorial soon to be commissioned in Auburn Hills

AUBURN HILLS, Mich. (FOX 2) - Ben Wodniak is a Macomb 14-year-old who has worked on a memorial to pay tribute to the men and women who have served in Desert Storm.

He has been working on it for an Eagle Scout project. and on Saturday his Auburn Hills memorial will be commissioned.

FOX 2: "Ben, how did the idea come about for this project?"

"So we always come here for Boy Scouts for flag retirements,  and I knew Mr. Mike really well. And I knew that he served in the Desert Shield/Desert Storm war," he said. "And I always wanted to do something for the soldiers that died in action. And I found this as a perfect opportunity."

FOX 2: "Tell me the significance of the names that are on this memorial here."

"So every name that you see on the wall is specifically engraved to a single brick. And each name is the name of a soldier that died during the Desert Shield, Desert Storm War," said Ben.

FOX 2: "When you want veterans to come back here, what is the message or connection that you want to share with him?"

"So I kind of built this area as a place to just reminisce and just send a prayer to those that served," he said.

FOX 2: "How's it feel knowing that this weekend, this is going to be commissioned, and this will be here and will be recognized by Auburn Hills?"

"It's really good. I enjoyed (that) it'll be recognized because this isn't a topic that people tend to talk about a lot," Ben said. "And we're having members of the local post here. We're having city officials coming over here. And we're just gonna have a big opening for it."

FOX 2: "How much work went into putting this together?"

"So we had to fundraise a lot, and obviously, we had to have a lot of helpers come and help just build this in general. It took a lot of leadership and just executing to make this happen."