The Upton boys never could understand how their quiet, fireside-dwelling, teetotaller grandfather always had a steady stream of visits from men who normally did their socialising down the pub.
He bought his grandsons their first bicycles and did other grandfatherly things but that didn't explain the fascination with which he was regarded in his native village of Ballylanders, Co Limerick.
Then one day in 1966, shortly before the 50th anniversary of the 1916 Rising, an envelope arrived from a granduncle in New Zealand containing a cartoon from a newspaper's "On This Day" historical column.
The cartoon was of one Christopher Upton, who had the peculiar honour of an entry in The Guinness Book of Records as survivor of the longest non-fatal hunger-strike in history.
This Christopher Upton lasted 94 days without food on Spike Island, a feat never yet beaten. The Upton boys looked at grandad by the fireside with incredulity.
"We were amazed. We couldn't get over the idea of grandad being a hero in the War of Independence. He was just grandad," recalled Christopher Jnr as he waited in Ballylanders for the cortege bearing the remains of Patrick Maher to arrive.
Now approaching middle-age themselves, Christopher Jnr and his brother Michael, have caught up on the family history but can only speculate why their grandfather never spoke to them about his own starring role in it.
"I often thought he wanted to keep us from getting involved in case we'd get ideas and get into trouble," said Michael.
It was different in the Quinlan household. Geraldine Quinlan (25) grew up with tales of her granduncle, Patrick Maher, told to her by Patrick's half-brother, her grandfather, Thomas.
"As soon as I could hear, I knew about Patrick. It was bred into me. I think I always understood how important he was and how brave a man he was," she said.
For her, seeing his coffin brought back to his native south Limerick with full State honours justified her loyalty to his memory.
"I don't think there is any better feeling inside than to know that you helped fulfil someone's last wish. It feels great. It's a very emotional day."
The return of Patrick Maher brought back memories for dozens of families in the area. Shops and businesses stayed shut as locals piled into the church grounds at Ballylanders to watch a big screen relaying the Requiem Mass from St Patrick's Church up the hill at Glenbrohane which could fit only close family members and dignitaries.
At Glenbrohane, where the flowers were arranged in the colours of the Tricolour, people recalled with pride how they saved the tiny and then dilapidated church from demolition in the 1990s, standing firm until a preservation order was in place and a grant for its refurbishment was in the post.
It was the church where Patrick Maher was baptised and the place where he worshipped before his arrest.
How awful it would have been, they said, if it had not been there to welcome him home.
At Ballylanders Cemetery, there was also a sign that the homecoming was long expected. In the republican plot, a large Celtic cross was inscribed in the 1920s with the names of four other local heroes, leaving the exact amount of space to add one more name.
"It was perfect," said John Tobin, rubbing a finger over the name of his uncle, David Tobin, who died in a gun battle with the Black and Tans on the street in Ballylanders. "Like he was meant to come home."