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Will Marek loves to tell stories. I know this because, well, he’s my dad.

One of his favorites involves a trip to San Francisco with my mom and his parents.

“We decided we were on our own one night, we were just going to do different things instead of a big group dinner with all of us,” he says. “So your mom and I went to Tadich Grill. We were having dinner there and we hear a loud voice a few tables over, and we immediately know it’s (your grandfather) — they were sitting two tables over from us.”

He laughs the heartiest of hearty laughs, like he can still hear his dad two tables over.

He has dozens of stories like this.

His grandfather Doug Welch (a columnist for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer for 33 years) dined there for the first time in 1945 while he was covering the San Francisco Conference, which resulted in the creation of the United Nations Charter. My mom and dad went to dinner at Tadich the night before their wedding in 1986 at Swedenborgian Church in Pac Heights. A framed photo from 1989 of my mom, my little brother and me sitting in one of Tadich’s booths hangs in my childhood home in Southern California to this day.

Courtesy of Will Marek

The Buich family, which has owned Tadich since 1928, has heard plenty of stories like these through the years — it’s something that comes with being the oldest restaurant in San Francisco, 171 years running.

“Those are the stories we love to hear,” says Tadich CFO Melissa Buich, “and hope to continue hearing for decades to come.”

Emphasis on the “hope.”

The coronavirus pandemic and the Bay Area’s ensuing shelter-in-place order on March 16 forced Tadich — and so many others across The City — to close their doors last week, something they don’t often do.

“I was talking with our grandfather, even in World War II we were able to serve food,” Melissa says. “They’d black out the windows, food was rationed, but we were a seafood house so we had the ability to have access to additional supply whereas other restaurants might not have. We were still able to serve customers, provide jobs to employees — this is just a totally different animal we’re trying to tackle.”

Emphasis on the “we.”

Unlike a lot of bars and restaurants in the city, Tadich hasn’t let a single employee go.

They can’t. Most of their staff has worked there for more than two decades, donning starch white coats and lovably gruff smiles. And while the wainscoting-rich booths certainly look nice, and the fine dining seafood classics certainly taste delicious, the reason Tadich continues to be an institution is the people. And it’s why five generations of my family has made Tadich a part of our lives.

Melissa’s sister Melanie Buich tells the story of an employee who gave both sisters San Francisco Giants hats when they were eight years old. That same employee attended Melanie’s baby shower more than two decades later to give her newborn a San Francisco Giants hat of her own.

“Our employees are our DNA,” Melissa says. “We couldn’t do this without each and every one of them. My dad’s goal is to go through this without losing one employee.”

Her dad, owner and CEO Mike Buich, is as old school as they come (in case the omnipresent coat hooks in the booths didn’t tip you off).

When the Healthy San Francisco mandate (which required businesses with more than 20 employees to set aside money for their workers’ healthcare) went into effect in 2008, many restaurants passed the added costs on to customers.

Not Tadich.

“Our dad had a lot of pride in never doing that,” Melissa says. “It ate into our margin, but that was that. What’s tough now is he’s so used to doing this on his own, tapping into what he and mom saved over the years.”

Now Melissa and Melanie (who both serve on the Tadich Board of Directors) help shoulder the financial burden.

“At this point, we’ve even told our dad we’re willing to go into our personal savings accounts to make sure our employees are paid,” Melanie says. “It’s beyond what the restaurant can afford, now it’s what can the family do to afford this.”

Both sisters have day jobs in addition to their roles at the restaurant and say they’re willing to deposit their day job earnings directly back into Tadich — whatever it takes to ensure the family legacy doesn’t die.

Like many restaurants struggling to get through this, Tadich has set up an Employee Relief Fund on GoFundMe (you can donate to it here) that will be used for group benefits and employee wages. Mike Buich is personally matching the first $25,000 in the fund and they’ve already raised $15,020 as of Thursday evening.

“Buich and Tadich are one in the same,” Melanie says. “It’s part of our makeup. We worked back in the kitchen with the chef making crab cake patties when we were old enough to walk. Then when we were older we were dishwashers, and older again we were hostesses. It’s where we got our work ethic. We’ve got a lot of loyal customers in SF, and generations of memories — that’s what we’re here to do, we need to play our part. It’s so important for us to continue the legacy.”

For you and me both.

Grant Marek is the Editorial Director of SFGATE. Email: grant.marek@sfgate.com | Twitter: @grant_marek