Rory Mason joined the fourth generation of his family to play for club and county when he made his debut for Paddy Tally's Down in Sunday's Bank of Ireland Dr McKenna Cup against Cavan.
The Mason family have been the bedrock of Loughinisland club football and great servants to Down.
A picture on the Down GAA Memories twitter feed showed a picture of three generations of Mason's who played for Down, Pat, who played in the 30's, Brendan (Rory's Dad) who played in the 80's and 90's and Desmond who featured for the Mourne men during the 50's.
It is a proud occasion for the Mason family but Rory wasn't the first of the fourth generation to play for Down as that honour went to his sister Laura, who was Down Ladies vice-captain and a Northern Ireland netballer three year's ago
And there are fewer prouder than dad Brendan.
“My Granda, Daddy, my uncle Sean, myself, Rory and Laura all played for club and county,” said Brendan.
“It is great, but to be honest I never thought more about it until someone put the photograph last week in Down Memories and then of course Rory made his debut last week,” said Brendan.
“My Daddy always said that Laura playing for the county two years ago was the fourth generation of the Masons to play for county.”
Brendan's dad Desmond, who turned 84 in October, still works as an electrician and he could be found up a ladder changing light bulbs outside Loughinisland church over the Christmas period.
Brendan said he was happy to see his son line out for Down on Sunday but he has avoided passing on advice from his playing days.
“I don't say too much to Rory because any advice I give him could be the wrong advice if it isn't similar to what his management is looking from him,” said Brendan.
“Rory is good listener so he will do what he is told anyway.”
And Brendan tells a wee story about Rory, who is primary school teacher at Ardglass: “Two years ago Loughinisland won the Ulster Intermediate Championship and I was managing Darragh Cross and we were in Division Two along with Loughinisland, and Jerome Johnston who was managing the Blues at the time said to Rory: 'don't tell your Da anything'.
“And then when the League was over and they were in the Ulster Championship they played an a Tyrone team (Greenlough).
“One day someone came into the shop and said to me: 'I hear Conor O'Tool is playing sweeper on Sunday.'
“So I said to Rory on the Saturday night 'is Conor O'Tool playing sweeper?
“I never noticed,” Rory said.
“So I asked him did he play it in training?''
'I don't think so,' Rory replied.
“So the next thing we were sitting in Omagh and O'Tool was wearing the number 15 jersey and goes back to play as sweeper. I said to myself: 'fair play to you Rory, you've done what Jerome told you to do.'
“So he didn't open his mouth.”
Brendan was part of the Down U21 management team alongside Frank Dawson and he is delighted with the direction Down manager Paddy Tally has taken.
“There is a bit of a buzz about the county and you can see that they are trying young fellas and last Sunday it was great to see so many young fellas,” Brendan said.
“I was involved with Frank Dawson with the U21 team a few seasons ago and I think there were 12, including subs that played on Sunday, who were part of our U21 squad and perhaps some of them could have been tried out sooner, so we must have been doing something right.”
Loughinisland will be back in the top flight of the Down All-County League and after winning promotion last season as well as making the last eight of the Senior Club Championship.
And the rise of the Blue Wave hasn't gone unnoticed as Loughinisland's Aaron and Declan McClements, Johnny Rory and the injured Johnny Flynn are part of the Down squad.
