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Whitewater Legend

Payson Kennedy

Payson Kennedy is founder of the

largest whitewater outdoor center in

the U.S.

Stuntman in the movie Deliverance,

slalom and downriver competitor,

outdoor guru, globe trotter, he has

been a leader and a source of

inspiration to the thousands of

people he’s guided and worked with

throughout the years.

Thirty-one years after starting the

Nantahala Outdoor Center and in his

70th year, Payson is still intent on

taking risks, exploring the world, and

facing the challenges of living in the

present moment.

A true whitewater legend.

Whitewater Legend

Payson Kennedy“An Invitation to Share a Life Adventure”

Text by Bob Beazley

Photography courtesy of NOC

“An Invitation to Share a Life Adventure”

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“We would like to find a few individuals or families interested in

sharing an unusual adventure in an alternative lifestyle. Last summer our

family with the help of about eight young people operated the Nantahala

Outdoor Center. Since that taste of a different style of life we have found it

difficult to readjust to life in the city, our jobs in large impersonal

organizations, friends scattered about in a population of thousands, and

never-ending driving from activity to activity in urban traffic.We find our

thoughts constantly returning to the Nantahala and the kind of life that

might be possible there.”

-Excerpt from first NOC newsletter-

The year was 1972.

U.S. President Nixon

was desperately

trying to end the

Vietnam War, white-

water had its debut

as an Olympic event

in Munich and

Payson and Aurelia

Kennedy, living in

Atlanta at the time,

had just made a

decision that would

alter their lives fore-

ver and have a pro-

found influence on

the world of white-

water. Payson deci-

ded to leave his

tenured position at

Georgia Tech, Aurelia left her teaching job, and they sold their house and moved

with their four children to start an outdoor center on the Nantahala River. Their

friend Horace Holden had just bought a 14 unit motel on the Nantahala called the

Tote and Tarry. It came with a restaurant and souvenir shop. He asked Payson and

Aurelia if they would like to manage it. Payson had been considering a career chan-

ge to outdoor recreation and found the offer extremely exciting. Their colleagues

in Atlanta thought they were crazy. It was too big a risk. Whitewater as a sport

was still in it’s infancy in the U.S. and there was no indication at the time that it

was going to grow rapidly.

In 1972 the first year of NOC operation, the number of employees was about 10:

The Kennedy family, Jim Holcombe, some scouts from Payson’s troop in Atlanta and

a few other friends and locals. By 2002, the number of employees had climbed to

over 600. In 1972 the number of people the NOC took rafting down the Nantahala

was about 800. In recent years, NOC’s busiest single day on the Nantahala comes

close to that at about 600. In 2002 NOC guided over 100,000 rafters on six diffe-

rent rivers in the southeast. “When we started NOC there was no business plan, no

marketing, and little capital. There was just this belief that we could make it work.

I found it so incredibly energizing and exciting, that’s why I wanted to make a

change… I kind of had this theory that if you were that much caught up in it, you

could make it successful. You might make mistakes but if you could keep working

at it you could figure out how to do things. So I was pretty confident. Relia was

a little more nervous.” At the time of writing their first newsletter, the Kennedy’s

couldn’t have imagined in their wildest dreams where their risky career change

would eventually lead.

If there is one thread that runs through Payson Kennedy’s life that might give us

a clue as to the success of NOC and of Payson himself it is his love of taking risks.

However, if it were that simple there would be far more success stories, as the world

is full of risk takers. For Payson, taking the risk is only the first step. The other

essential piece is committing himself 110% to making it work. Once the initial leap

of faith has been made he focuses on all the reasons it can work rather than why

it can’t. In essence it is like paddling a rapid. You keep your vision focused on

the clean line rather

than the obstacles

you are trying to

avoid. With enough

hard work and focus

on the goal over

time, you will even-

tually achieve suc-

cess. It sounds

basic enough. Yet as

you talk with Payson

and observe him

working you find the

concept has a lot

more depth and a

spiritual Zen like

quality to it. “I love

getting into that

state when you are

right on the edge of

your ability, of what

you think you can do. You forget about it and just do it without worrying about

the risk, who’s watching, or what the consequences are. I find that I perform

beyond my usual ability. I am completely focused, thinking about nothing but what

I am doing right in that moment.” He describes it as the flow state. It is a state

we have all experienced at certain times in our lives. Athletes, musicians, dancers,

artists, fisherman, mystics, monks and mechanics all describe it in their own lan-

guage, the essence of which is a one pointed focus of total absorption in whate-

ver you are doing. Time seems to disappear. Mundane concerns like fatigue, hun-

ger, and boredom fade into the background and in their place we experience a sense

of well being characterized by euphoria, energy, enthusiasm, exhilaration and exci-

tement. These 5 Es are perhaps Payson’s favorite words and ones that come up in

conversation time and again when he tries to explain who he is, what his life is

about and how it shaped NOC.

Kashmir, India 1988

often you see the president out digging ditches to lay

a new sewer line. It made me always want to give

100%…” Payson believed in leading by example and

spent time working in each department from rafting

to grounds maintenance to the reservations office.

From his own experience and extensive reading on

the subject, Payson also knew that providing the right

level of challenge for the staff was one of the key ele-

ments to creating the flow state and encouraging

peak performance. In terms of the everyday workings

of NOC, this meant minimizing systemization so staff

had the ability to think on their own and make per-

sonal decisions rather than learning and acting by

rote. Payson believed that employee ownership too

would encourage staff to strive for peak performance.

In addition to creating conditions conducive to the

flow state, he also aimed to make NOC a place where

people wanted to live and work for years, not just a

season or two. These goals led to a series of initiati-

ves that started with staff housing in 1975, and, over

the years, evolved into stock ownership, health insu-

rance, vacation and sick pay, self-awareness works-

hops, book discussion groups centered on self-aware-

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He says he first experienced this flow state

in a religious setting. In his early college years he

considered becoming a minister. However, the more

he studied philosophy and religion the more he found

“insurmountable obstacles” in the form of irreconcila-

ble questions that would have made it difficult to

devote his life to religion. He also found that being

in the outdoors, hiking, caving, climbing and padd-

ling enhanced this flow the most. “When I get into a

new project I get pretty enthused and tend to forget

the downside and look mainly at the possibilities.

That was what had impressed me so much with padd-

ling. We might drive in a weekend up

to West Virginia and back for a race

and drive all night long to get back.

could have seemed incredibly unreaso-

nable and tiring, just too much, but

we were so energized that it was fun

and exciting. We could do without

sleep and just keep going.”

Ultimately, whitewater grew to be his

outdoor cathedral; it is where he enga-

ges this connection to life the fullest.

Payson’s life has been a

quest to spend as much time in the

flow as possible. Over time he has

developed the ability to reach this

state in more and more activities, from

reading a financial statement to terra-

cing the hill adjacent to his cabin. His

vision for NOC was to create a center

for excellence, but more than that, a

place where people could come and

work together in the flow state. He

believed if the staff members at NOC

were reaching the flow state in their

life and work; it would deeply affect

not only them but the guests as well.

People who were not experiencing the

five E’s in their lives and work at home

would feel the vibrancy and enthu-

siasm at NOC and want to return again

and again. To this end, he tried to

create conditions at NOC which would foster this state

and result in staff members performing at their peak

ability. When looking at the changes and develop-

ments Payson encouraged at NOC through the years it

is clear that every step was made with this goal in

mind. Shane Benedict remembers, “It was wild to

come to NOC as a 23 year old river bum and have the

president of the company recommend the book Zen

and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance to help make

you a better raft guide. Payson’s attitude inspired me

to look at everything I did in a different way. It’s not

ness and the flow state, and a very flexible work sche-

dule to accommodate racers and explorers.

It worked; his vision created a fertile

ground for people of like minds to work and live toge-

ther in an environment that was both challenging and

fulfilling. Over the years NOC attracted a virtual who’s

who in the whitewater world. Numerous Olympic and

National team members have worked at NOC. The list

of international whitewater expedition explorers is

just as long. Working at NOC inspired countless peo-

ple to create lifestyles for themselves centered around

whitewater. Many former NOC staff have gone on to

establish their own companies in

outfitting, instruction, and equip-

ment design and production.

As Payson hoped it would, the atti-

tude of the staff rubbed off on the

guests as well. NOC’s explosion of

growth in the 70’s and 80’s was lar-

gely due to word of mouth from

NOC “addicts”. The guests were

brought back time and again by the

atmosphere at NOC and also by the

technical expertise present there.

Payson’s enthusiasm for teaching

and openness to new ideas esta-

blished NOC as a hotbed for inno-

vation and creative thought about

all aspects of whitewater sports.

Many of the current techniques in

river safety, rafting, and whitewa-

ter instruction were developed at

NOC.

Payson’s love of adventure and

commitment to staff led early on to

the beginnings of the NOC

Adventure Travel program. Payson

saw this as another way to keep

good staff around by providing

work in warmer climates during the

NOC winter. In 1976, The River of

Ruins trip on the Usumacinta River

in Guatemala became NOC’s first adventure travel trip.

As with all authentic adventure travel, the trip had its

share of character stretching incidents. “An earthqua-

ke closed the Guatemala City airport so we had to fly

into Belize and figure out how to get the gear out of

customs and overland to Guatemala. The government

made us take a customs officer with us to the border

to make sure we didn’t sell any gear before we got to

Guatemala. When we got to the border, our driver

Jimmy was waiting with his truck ‘Sugar Baby’.” The

adventure far from over they were also forced to spend

Racing slalom and the Nantahala

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one of the nights floating on the rafts because they

misjudged how slow the current was on the upper

river.

In 1978 Payson traveled to Nepal for the

first time to explore rivers with Don Weedon, an NOC

guide who lived in Nepal at the time. Nepal had a

profound effect on Payson. He gave up leading the

Usumacinta trip to start

leading trips in Nepal in

1979. It was an ambi-

tious undertaking consis-

ting of a two week trek

into the Lang Tang area

followed by a nine day

trip on the Sun Kosi

River. Over the years the

treks and rivers have

changed but Nepal

remains Payson’s favorite

trip. After one of the

trips, he stayed and

explored Asia for six

months. Part of this

time was spent furthe-

ring his investigations of

the flow state in a one

month retreat at the Kopan

Monastery in Katmandu

meditating and studying

Tibetan Buddhism.

Payson’s life before NOC

was as full and varied as

his life afterwards. He

was born in Atlanta in

1933. His first paddling

experiences were as a

cub scout in 1942. This

lead to overnight trips in

northern Georgia and

water sports merit bad-

ges at Camp Pioneer.

Those were the days of

wood and canvas canoes

and running rocky rapids

was not encouraged. In high school he met an attrac-

tive woman at the church social group named Aurelia.

At the time she was 12 and he was 14; they married

seven years later in 1954. He had just graduated from

Emory University with a degree in philosophy and was

getting ready to enter the Army counter intelligence

corp. As a wedding present Raymond Eaton, of Camp

Merriwood, paddled the Nantahala with Aurelia. At

water with Claude Terry and Doug Woodward.

In the late 60’s Payson was involved with a series of

events that fostered the growth of the sport in the

southern U.S. In 1967 Horace Holden started the

Georgia Canoe Association. In 1969 the Nantahala

started hosting races, the first in the Southeast.

About the same time,

southern author James

Dickey wrote his novel

Deliverance, a dark tale

of man’s primal side set

against the backdrop of

four friends on a canoe

trip in the southern

Appalachia. Payson,

Claude Terry and Doug

Woodward were hired as

consultants, safety men,

and stunt doubles on the

movie. “They hired a

Navy Seal at first to help,

but after he flipped a

raft and lost a camera,

they contacted Claude,

Doug and me to come

help.” While filming the

movie, Payson,

Claude and Doug

ran the Five Falls

section of the

Chattooga River,

mostly class 4 and

5, in Grumman alu-

minum canoes. This

was possibly the

first time the Five

Falls had been run

successfully tandem. Another tricky scene

involved swimming down the rapid just above

Deliverance Rock. This scene was later spliced

into the famous waterfall scene which was

actually filmed in the Tallulah Gorge. The movie

came out in 1972, NOC’s first year in business.

The movie stimulated public awareness of whi-

tewater sports and created new interest in

paddling rivers, especially the Chattooga.

Payson loves to compete. Anyone who has paddled

their raft next to him across Lake Tugaloo at the end

of the Chattooga section 4 can attest to this. His

crews rarely stop paddling, and if they do Payson

doesn’t. He was sad to see the implementation of

power boats to pull the rafts across the lake.

that time Nantahala Falls was rated a class V. Aurelia

was one of the first women to run it.

Payson’s paddling continued through col-

lege and the army. In 1958 he entered graduate

school at Emory and earned a master’s degree in

Sociology and Anthropology. After teaching in

Virginia for four years, he moved to Illinois to get a

M.S. in Library Science from the University of Illinois.

Most of his free time was spent raising his family of

budding paddlers with Aurelia and exploring rivers,

often as scout master for the local troop. In 1964 the

Kennedy’s moved back to Atlanta so Payson could take

a job with the Georgia Tech Library. He became the

faculty advisor to the Georgia Tech outing club and

started an explorer scout post specializing in white-

“…euphoria, energy, enthusiasm, exhilaration and excitement. These 5 Es are perhaps Payson’s favorite words…”

Payson as a stuntman in the filming of Delivrance

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It goes against his sense of self-sufficiency. He has

won six national championships in open canoe white-

water competition, and the master’s (over forty) in

kayak slalom and wild water. He has also won nume-

rous triathlons including open, masters and over fifty-

five classes. An avid biker he has done trips in

Ireland, England and New Zealand and

competed in the 100 mile “Bridge to

Bridge” bicycle race. In 1997 he was

inducted in the Emory University Sports

Hall of Fame.

His legacy of adventure tra-

vel trips is just as impressive. He has

lead trips all over the world and been

invited to participate in numerous

explorations. In 1988 the Tourism

Board of Jammu and Kashmir in India

invited Payson to explore rivers in the

Indian Himalaya, consult on the poten-

tial for whitewater trips, and train local

guides.

Several years later he was asked to lead

the whitewater portion of the first sour-

ce to sea trip down the Ganges in India.

In 1989 Payson put together a team for

the first International Rafting Rally put

on by Project RAFT (Russians and

Americans for Teamwork). The event

was held in a remote part of Siberia on

the Chuya River. Everybody camped out

on the river bank like one big family on

a river trip. For many it was an inspi-

ring meeting, fourteen international

river teams competing for peace in the

spirit of friendship and love of the river.

In the closing ceremonies Payson invi-

ted Project Raft to hold the event the

next year, 1990, at the Nantahala with

NOC as the host. The proposal was a

huge gamble. The NOC was not in a

remote area where everyone could just

camp out and cook over campfires, nor

was it in a city with ample accommoda-

tion available. Payson recalls, “At the

time I had no idea where everyone

would be housed, where the events

would be held, how the transportation

and logistics would be handled much

less who would fund it all.” What he did know was

what he felt. He and everyone else there were in the

flow. They had just pulled off the event in Siberia,

and with enough enthusiasm, hard work and planning

they could do the same thing at NOC.

What would become known as “Nantahala

90” was a major event that required flexibility and

tenacity. In the week before the event, twenty-three

teams from at least fourteen countries arrived at air-

ports up and down the East coast. The day before the

race was scheduled to start, the Nantahala was so

high due to persistent rain you could paddle through

the NOC parking lot. The next morning while the

teams were still in Atlanta for the opening ceremo-

nies, Payson got a call from the NOC. “Don’t bring

those teams up here today. We can’t use half the faci-

lities, we’re underwater. There is nowhere to house or

feed all those people.” With typical aplomb Payson

shrugged his shoulders and said “Well I guess we’ll

just have to see if the host families here in Atlanta

mind if we stay another night.”

Payson sees risk as a necessary and

mostly enjoyable part of life. If he had-

n’t taken many of the early risks at NOC

like moving up from Atlanta and leaving

the security of their city jobs behind he

would never be where he is today. Much

of his success is also the result of the

tremendous support he has had from

the incredible staff and friends that

have spent time at NOC. His wife

Aurelia is surely at the top of this list.

From the very beginning he acknowled-

ges it was their shared vision that sha-

ped the NOC concept. Her influence at

NOC can be seen as readily as his. She

has been his companion on countless

trips all over the world and continues to

share the adventures they now pursue,

whether it’s a Habitat for Humanity

Project (they’ve done five so far) or tra-

veling to Denmark to spend time with

their oldest son John and his family.

Now in his 70th year Payson has lost

little of his energy and thirst for chal-

lenge. He still guides regularly and

works out daily biking, paddling or

doing one of his “projects”. He compe-

tes often in whatever race is going on.

He says he feels a little guilty about not

having any great ambitions now that he

is retired. However, mention an adven-

ture like a bike trip through India and

his eyes light up like “when do we

leave?”. His grandson Andrew Holcombe

is a world class whitewater freestyle

competitor. He placed second at the

World Freestyle Championships this year

in Austria. When asked what he thinks

about this continuing of the lineage he

says simply, “I find it very satisfying.”

In the end perhaps what is most ama-

zing about Payson is that he appears ageless in his

enthusiasm for life and the task at hand. His present

project is using a wheelbarrow and shovel to build an

island in the pond next to their cabin. “I love it” he

says, “It puts me in the flow.”

The gas station in the sixties that would become the NOC store on the Nantahala River Bank

The same place in the eighties…

…in the nineties