Mark Reiff has transformed his Woodland, California home into a homage to Route 66, including a gas station, diner, barbershop and movie theater.

WOODLAND, Calif. — Mark Reiff lives on an ordinary street in what was an ordinary house — until he bought a 1930s gas station pump at a yard sale.

In just nine years, inspired by the old Wayne pump, he turned his ranch-style tract house into an homage to Route 66, complete with a diner, barbershop, movie theater and gas station. He calls it "Woodland's Greatest Tourist Attraction," and yet he still calls it home.

"People are amazed. They say, 'Wow, you really live here?' Well, yeah," says the 60-year-old Reiff.

He gives tours of his backyard and collectibles-filled home by appointment, for a $7 donation.

He launched his eye-popping Route 66 remake in the front yard, where in 2000 he built a fake filling station with a two-pump island and a service-bell hose that ding-dings when you drive over it. Reiff's Gas Station looks so real, you would expect a friendly attendant to fill 'er up and check under the hood.

It's certainly fooled a few people.

"When I was building the barbershop," says Reiff, "I see this four-wheel-drive go around the corner real slow, and I hear ding-ding. I could see through the diner window this old guy getting his wallet out, and I can see his wife's mouth, saying, 'This isn't real.'

"So I walked around and said to him, 'Can I help you?' And he said, 'This isn't real, is it?' I said, 'No, buddy. You should listen to your wife.'"

Once Reiff finished the gas station, he built next to it a faux diner with a chrome-rimmed counter and red vinyl stools.

"I remember seeing Route 66 stuff on TV," he says. "Everywhere there was a gas station, there was a diner close by."

Turns out, Reiff has never driven along Route 66, the storied highway built about 70 years ago between Chicago and Santa Monica. He never saw firsthand the mom-and-pop businesses that popped up along the so-called Mother Road. This entire facade is simply the Route 66 of his imagination.

"I hardly ever get out of Woodland," he says with a shrug.

After he finished the diner (the kitchen service window is actually his bedroom window), Reiff moved around to the McKinley Avenue side of the Jefferson Street house and constructed a barbershop and a movie theater that announces "Rebel Without a Cause," the 1955 James Dean drama, on the marquee.

"That's me; I'm the rebel without a cause," says Reiff.

As startling as this place is to unwary passers-by, it's the garage that literally stops traffic. A small Cessna appears to have pierced the roof nose-first, and a '56 Oldsmobile Rocket 88 seems to have crashed into a wall, leaving skid marks (black paint) and a knocked-over picket fence in its wake.

One day, Reiff saw a man driving down McKinley Avenue who hit his brakes so hard when he spied the "crash scene" that the camper shell almost flew off his pickup.

Sometimes folks driving through the neighborhood stop, park and get out for a closer look.

"I might be sitting in the house," says Reiff, "and if people are walking around, I might get up and invite them in. They'll say, 'Do you mind?' and I say, 'I didn't mind my parents, why should I mind you?'"

Reiff, who grew up here, is divorced with grown children and grandchildren. He bought the house in 1978 and supports himself, and it, with a parking-lot sweeping business. He also designs landscapes and mows lawns.

And he swears he doesn't know how much he's spent to create this Route 66 scene.

He now owns 40 vintage gas pumps, many of which line the walls of his second garage (which also houses his red Chevrolet Corvette). His house is filled to overflowing with 1950s roadside memorabilia and antiques. His backyard is decorated with dozens and dozens of gas station logos and tire company signs. He often rents out his patio, which comes with a bar and a barbecue pit, for car club meetings.

His latest acquisition is the '56 Chevy tow truck he bought for $600. He had it fully restored and painted white and red, his favorite color.

"Everything you see here was in the last nine years. I'm kind of obsessed," he says. "I bought that first gas pump around the corner at a garage sale for 75 bucks. Then one day I was standing at my front window and thought, 'It would be cool to have a gas station here.' The wheels started turning, and this is what happened."

Carol McCraw, 88, has lived in the house next door for 55 years and watched Reiff's Route 66 scene come together piece by piece.

"He's a very good neighbor," she says. "The house, I think, is great. People come from all over to see it."

"We love it," says her granddaughter Barbara Chronister. "I don't know any neighbors who don't like it."

They look forward to the annual Street Bash, when Reiff arranges for Jefferson and McKinley to be closed to traffic (except for custom hot rods).

"Everybody gets in their front lawn and barbecues," says Chronister, "and my grandmother goes down the street in her power chair."

Reiff is sensitive when it comes to questions about building permits for the obvious "remodel" that stands bright white and fire-engine red in a normal neighborhood. He says he applied for and was granted just one permit, to pour the gas station's concrete approach.

Paul Hanson, senior planner for the city of Woodland, is equally discreet on the matter of permits.

"It's a sensitive question. I'll have to punt," he says.

As for Reiff's Gas Station, Hanson says, "It's kind of a landmark in town. We enjoy it. It's a neat thing to have in Woodland."

Reiff plans to continue adding to his live-in museum and welcoming visitors who might buy a signature Reiff's Gas Station T-shirt or ball cap and listen to his stories. He laughs about the inebriated young man who, late one night, broke into the diner and attempted to buy a pack of smokes from the vintage cigarette machine.

Reiff is always on the lookout for roadside finds, although it's a wonder he has room for any more.

"I like old stuff," he says, "I guess because I like the way it looks, and it reminds me of the '50s when life was slow and easygoing. This place is real comfortable and brings back fond memories for people.