John Goddard was born John Melvin Goddard on July 29, 1924 to Percival Lundberg Goddard and Lattie Alice Sorenson in Salt Lake City, Utah. His career as an anthropologist started with joining the Air Force during World War II. After he was discharged, he began his education at the University of Southern California where he majored in anthropology and psychology. John's career was defined by going to remote locations and studying the people there. He studied over 200 primitive civilizations in his quest to understand what modern life did to civilizations. He was also an adventurer and climbed many mountains and studied and went down many of the world's most treacherous rivers. John visited almost every country in the world. His adventures would eventually gain him the name of "real life Indiana Jones" by the New York Times. He has written many books and among the notable titles are "The Survivor" and "Kayaks Down the Nile". John married Virginia Pearlyne Crowley on June 13, 1952, and they had one child. He died on May 17, 2013, in Glendale, California.