About Chris Pangalos

Chris Pangalos is the founder and Commander of The Warriors of Greece. A lifelong history enthusiast, Chris grew up captivated by stories of Ancient Greek courage in battle, excellence in athletics, beautiful performances in music & theater, Aesop’s fables, mythology, legendary gods & heroes and more.

Born and raised in New York, Chris starred in many sports earning varsity letters in soccer, wrestling, lacrosse and track & field, winning numerous personal awards & team championships along the way.

His skill on the soccer field and All-American recognition earned him a college scholarship and a few seasons of semi-professional soccer after graduation. He has been inducted into both his high school (LHS Hall of Fame) and college (KSC Hall of Fame) Halls of Fame.

Click here to watch the only surviving video footage of seventeen year old Lakeland High School Senior wrestler Chris Pangalos utterly destroying his opponent in the 128 lbs. weight class by a superior (technical fall) decision score of 17-1 (5 team points). This was Lakeland’s closest team match of the season edging perennial New York powerhouse Ossining High School 29-26 in Lakeland’s first ever undefeated 1980-81 wrestling season. Both coaches agreed that Pangalos was impressive in this upset match of the day. Lakeland coach Frank Vitolo (NY Section I Coach of the Year) had special praise for Pangalos stating, “He seems to have a way of winning key matches.”

Chris is the owner/operator of Rolling Thunder Productions, an award-winning Disc Jockey entertainment company and has performed for thousands of events all over the United States and around the world in places like Greece, Spain, Italy, Ireland, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Japan, Korea, Okinawa, France, Tunisia, etc. He has been seen on MTV and featured in numerous DJ magazines including DJ Times & Mobile Beat International to name a few. Chris is a true modern day American Spartan having served as a Sergeant in the US Marine Corps Infantry. He was the Machine Gun Section Leader for the Battalion’s Helicopter Assault Company as well as a Hand-to-Hand Combat Instructor. Involved in various forms of fighting styles from boxing and wrestling to mixed martial arts and karate since his youth, Chris is currently working on getting his Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do.

Chris is the genetic product of the mixture of two great warrior races of people. His father is a first generation Greek-American whose parents arrived in America via Ellis Island in the 1920's and settled in New York. Chris' father was born in Brooklyn during the Great Depression and served aboard the American Navy’s greatest battleship, the USS Missouri during the Korean War. From 1950 to 1953 he was the undefeated welterweight boxing champion of the fleet even beating the Golden Gloves champ of the United States in an exhibition bout! The family came from the island of Thasos off the coast of mainland Greece across from the town of Kavala in the Northern Aegean Sea. At the time Thasos was still under Turkish oppression and the stories of horrific atrocities by the occupying muslim troops are well known. Legend has it that the family left Greece because of an incident involving two Turkish soldiers who were harrassing a local pretty Greek girl with evil intent on their minds. One of the Pangalos men went to her aid and afterwards the soldiers were never seen again, ever. Soon after the soldiers disappearance, Chris' grandfather quietly left for America and no member of the family would set foot back on Greek soil until many decades later when Chris returned as a member of the US Marine Corps at the very end of the 20th century.

Chris' mother is from the island of Puerto Rico and the family's roots go back to Spain, home of the famed Spanish Infantrymen and possibly Portugal as well. Armed with swords made of Spanish Toledo steel, gallant Spanish Catholic knights drove the occupying muslim moors from Spain and began the Great Age of Exploration. Christopher Columbus, flying under the Spanish flag on ships crewed, supplied and financed by Spanish King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella discovered the New World and the brave, rugged Spanish Conquistadores colonized the island intermarrying with the native, warlike Boriqua tribe that had inhabited the island for centuries creating the dynamic culture and people of Puerto Rico.
Chris is 50% Greek, 50% Puerto Rican and 100% American!

The Pangalos name has a long and storied place throughout Greek history. It has been traced back to the 1821 Greek Revolutionary War of Independence when Nikolaos Pangalos introduced the legendary Greek military chieftain and war hero Theodore Kolokotronis to the secret revolutionary war organization known as the "Society of Friends" (Philike Etairia in Greek). That group would coordinate and begin the Greek War of Independence in 1821. In Byzantine times the mother of Emperor Basil II, known as "Basil the Bulgar Slayer" was named Pangalos and since that time the name has been found in many noble families. The Pangalos name has been found in Crete, Megara, the Ionian Islands of Pangalis and has been in southern Italy since Byzantine times. The Pangalos family name goes all the way back to Ancient Greece where a Pangalos fought with King Agesilaus of Sparta. More recently in the 1920's Greek General Theodore Pangalos was dictator of Greece from 1925-1926 and in the 1990's the Greek Foreign Minister was also named Theodore Pangalos.

Chris started The Warriors of Greece for many reasons, not the least of which was because he was tired of the stereotypical image of the Greek short order greasy spoon diner cook and hearing people always say, “Those Greeks sure do cook good!” when talking about his ethnicity and proud heritage. Not to take anything away from delicious Greek cooking but there is so much more that the Greek people have given to Western Civilization like democracy, the Olympics, medicine, architecture, Western warfare, theater, music, science, mathematics, history, law, philosophy and freedom itself that it really troubled him when all most people could think about was that Greeks make a really good gyro and fries! While not an expert in many of the other areas mentioned Chris was well versed in the martial prowess of Greece’s renowned military through time and decided to inform, educate and/or remind people about it and that is how The Warriors of Greece came to be. Since then The Warriors of Greece have been dedicated to preserving the honor, ideals and memories of all the courageous Greek fighters through the ages by participating in various celebrations of proud, defiant Greek independence, heritage and culture whenever and wherever possible at festivals, parades, school lectures, public appearances, etc.