Horace Holden

Horace Holden competed in C2 slalom canoeing at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. He was a 1986 graduate of Duke University who started canoeing only after college. He competed internationally from 1990-96. Like many American whitewater canoeists, Holden trained on the Nantahala River near Bryson City, North Carolina.

On one visit to the area, Holden was staying at the Tote-n-Tarry Motel on the banks of the Nantahala when he approached the owner and shook hands on a deal to buy the motel, a gas station, and 40 acres of land on the river. Holden eventually turned this into the Nantahala Outdoor Center (NOC), which become the mecca of whitewater canoeing in the Eastern United States. He and his business partner, Payton Kennedy, ran the NOC together as business partners for many years.

A licensed pilot, Holden was a pilot with American Eagle Airlines from 1997-2009. In 2009 Holden returned to school at Emory University and obtained an MMSc degree in anesthesia. He later worked as an anesthesiology assistant at Kennestone Hospital in Georgia, and then at Redmond Regional Medical Center in Rome, Georgia.