John Goodlette was born, grew up in Hazard, Kentucky. He studied at the University of Kentucky and became a mechanical engineer. He later became Chief Engineer for an ambitious project that at the time some people said could not be accomplished. As leader of this project, he led an innovative team of scientists and engineers to design a spacecraft that would fly 400 million miles and land on another planet. John Goodlette was the chief engineer for Viking, the first operational spacecraft to land on Mars on July 20, 1976.