Everyday hero: He protects his childhood beaches

Most at home when he's on the beach, a Laguna Beach go-getter uses his foundation to protect the coastline for future generations.


Everyday hero: He protects his childhood beaches

James Pribram is a professional surfer and the leader of the Eco-Warrior foundation, which raises awareness about environmental issues around the world and helps people find solutions to environmental problems.


James Pribram

Residence: Laguna Beach

Age: 42:

Favorite charity: Eco Warrior Foundation

To join the beach clean up efforts or to donate, write or go to Facebook/ECO-Warrior or Twitter at @ECOWarriorOrg.

“He has taken a lot of flack for the Eco Warrior persona and put himself out there, but he is serving a really wonderful purpose. He’s instilling a sense of stewardship and responsibility toward our beaches and fighting for access for everyone, so it does not just fall into the hands of the privileged.”

Richard Burgi, actor and Laguna Beach resident

“He’s always been passionate about the ocean. He’s been that way since we were four years old. He’s seen other organizations drop the ball on defending our oceans and he wants to take up the fight.”

Mike Ensch, longtime friend

In his nightmares, the feeling is always the same.

Sometimes the dream has him balancing on a huge pole jutting into the stratosphere, sometimes it's a kite, sometimes it's a ladder. But always there comes a point in which James Pribram is falling and falling, crashing toward the ground, knowing he can do nothing to stop it.

These nightmares have haunted Pribram as long as he can remember. But "it had been a while" since one had visited him when he found himself earlier this month on the lip of a 75-foot sheer cliff, about to jump off.

Now, you've got to understand, Pribram has done a lot of scary things in his life. He's famous for it, in fact. As a surfer on the pro circuit, Pribram tackled some of the world's most awe-inspiring surf. He has been the face of the Eco Warrior since 2006, a project initially launched by Ocean Pacific and the Surfer's Path to bring attention to the degradation of coastlines around the world from pollution and overpopulation. He sailed one of the ocean's most dangerous passages from Rio de Janeiro to South Africa, protested industries contaminating rivers in Chile, fought against pollution in the Great Lakes and challenged whale hunters in Japan. He's even saved a woman from drowning.

But Pribram had never rappelled over a cliff like this. He was doing it for a webcast of Men's Fitness magazine to promote his Eco Warrior Foundation, a nonprofit he founded last year to focus his coastline initiatives back where he started in Laguna Beach.

With it, he wants to instill a sense of stewardship of the ocean to the next generation and renew a beach ethic that he fears is waning.

"The beach I grew up on, it was a brotherhood. I was taught that we weren't just surfers, we were watermen. I know now it's a catchy phrase now, but if you grow up on a beach you better know how to swim and know the ocean. I know that ocean better than I know anything in life. I probably know that ocean better than I know myself. It's always been the one place where I have been most comfortable," Pribram says from across a table at his frequent breakfast hangout, The Coyote Grill in South Laguna.

He's a 42-year-old man who sprawls his legs out like a teenager, he's a "General Hospital" devotee (he'll even record it if he's going to miss an episode, say his friends), he's a guy who doesn't have a girlfriend but wants to have "the white picket fence" and a baby boy named Henry.

In other words, his laid-back style wouldn't make you pick him out of the crowd as a warrior.

And that's the point, maybe. Not polluting, looking out for each other, respecting the wildlife – that was just part of life at the beach, he says.

"It is so weird how times change, because I was taught just to do these things. That was part of being a man. Now because people are not taught the same, instead of being the normal thing to do, you're a hero."

There are so, so many things Pribram wants to do with his Eco Warrior Foundation, which include working with El Morro Elementary School to lead an essay contest about what it means to be an Eco Warrior, giving surf lessons to foster kids through the Urban Surfer program and heading Laguna's Adopt-A-Beach initiatives. The first one this year attracted 231 volunteers who picked up more than 300 pounds of trash and recyclables, and the events have grown from there.

Yet as Pribram was stepping off the edge of that cliff for that Men's Fitness shoot, he thought he might never get the chance to see his goals realized. A weird "click" came from the D-ring on his harness, and there was play in the rope.

"I thought it broke," he says. "All of a sudden, it was the same feeling as in my dreams. I remember for a moment almost being confused, my whole body had the same exact sensation as when I was falling in the dream. I thought for a split second – all my dreams came to this moment? I'm going to die like this, after everything? I thought, well, we'll find out what those dreams meant."

His co-host heard the D-ring catch, too, and told him not to move, but after a quick check the crew determined all was fine.

The fear, though, was a good reminder of why he does what he does, whether it's going over a cliff or paddling from San Francisco to San Diego: "When a person is willing to do something at that magnitude, when people see how willing you are to put yourself out there for a cause you believe in, it hopefully makes the point that they need to do something, too. I understand that people are scared and afraid; I'm scared and afraid all the time. I suppose in some ways I feel like if I'm going to get out of my comfort zone – a lot – then these other people better, too."

In fact, launching a foundation, he says, has gotten him way out of his comfort zone. "I was never comfortable in a classroom. I'm not the most outgoing person; I'm actually somewhat shy in certain settings and not a big public speaker by any means of imagination. I'm terrible at asking for money. I am just trying to step up because I need to, not because I want to."

What's riding on it, he says, is the promise of guiding a whole generation of Eco Warriors and giving children the kind of Laguna Beach he grew up in, where "the waves are the most beautiful swing set the world has ever seen."

Says Pribram: "It is so important that we empower and inspire. Find your love in life and go after it."

Contact the writer: 714-796-6892 or

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