LANDMARKS / COUNTY HISTORICAL SITES : Restaurant Is Still a Family Affair

HISTORY: Rebuilt as a bakery after a 1929 flood, the building was bought in 1935 by the Diaz family and opened as a cantina. After it became a restaurant, it was expanded in the 1950s, and extensive renovation was done in 1984.

LOCATION: 245 S. 10th St. in Santa Paula at the corner of Harvard Boulevard.

HOURS: Monday through Friday, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. and 4:30 to 9 p.m.; weekends, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Familia Diaz, a restaurant Jose and Josepha Diaz started at the corner of Harvard Boulevard and 10th Street in Santa Paula over half a century ago, has been chosen as a historical landmark by the Ventura County Cultural Heritage Board.

Because the building has undergone considerable renovation over its 55-year history, its cultural significance received the historical designation, board member Eleanor Crouch said.

That designation is based on the cafe’s significance as a gathering place and as a symbol of the important contribution made by Mexican settlers to Ventura County, said Joan Kus, planning director of Santa Paula’s Design Assistance Committee.

The restaurant has been in the family since it opened in 1936 as a cantina under the name Las Quince Letras. Jose Diaz chose the name because it amused him that there are 15 letters in the words which mean “the 15 letters,” said Dan Diaz, grandson of the founders.

Locals who gathered at the cantina for a beer would often ask for something to eat, which Pepa, as Josepha Diaz was known, would cook, often sending her daughter Vickie to the store for ingredients.

Word of Pepa’s cooking grew, and soon people came for the food and ordered a drink on the side. By 1950, Nora and Tony Diaz and Tony’s wife, Celia, were enlisted to help as the restaurant expanded from one small room, which held a bar and two tables, to a dining room that could seat 36.

In 1980, Dan Diaz, with a degree in business administration, and his sister Sandra, who owned a catering business, joined their parents in running the restaurant. By 1984, the family decided it was time to expand and added 1,500 square feet. The original cafe became a banquet hall that seats 60. The dining room can accommodate 120.

When it came time to renovate, the family visited other Mexican restaurants to get ideas about decor and then went to Mexico to buy tile and ornaments.

Dan recalls making tortillas for the restaurant every Saturday when he was a boy. He and his brother would place the masa on a conveyor belt then stack and package them while his mother sealed the packages with an iron. Familia Diaz now buys tortillas from local bakeries, but they still make corn chips on the premises, using up to 12,000 tortillas a day.

The tamales, too, are still handmade. Together, Celia and Nora Diaz have produced more than half a million in 40 years.