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Because of the U.S. government's growing interest in lunar and deep space exploration in 1958, JPL proposed a network of three stations in the U.S., South Africa and Australia that would track and provide Earth-based radio communications for spacecraft. Located in California's Mojave Desert, the Pioneer station was the first in the Deep Space Network.

The 26-meter (about 85 ft.) steerable parabolic dish antenna at the Pioneer Deep Space station was begun in the summer of 1958 and completed in November of the same year. The structure was 37 meters (over 120 ft.) tall and weighed over 450,000 kilograms (about 5,000 tons).