Johnny,
That apostrophe is called a "prefix," and indicates that the contents is
text - not to be interpreted as a number, formula, or anything else. Text
is text, and is displayed as entered. Otherwise, an entry starting with =
(also + or - sometimes) is interpreted as a formula, an entry that looks
like a date is converted to a date-serial number, with date formatting. And
more. If you remove it, unintended things may happen. Depends on what's in
the cell.