Children across Orange County are waking up to presents Christmas morning thanks to the Orange County Children’s Toy Box.
The 100% volunteer-operated organization has been bringing Christmas gifts to local children and families for 34 years. It was founded in 1991 by Donna Waugh-Robinson, whose family owned the former Waugh Harley-Davidson in Orange. The dealership was sold to Stonewall Harley-Davidson several years ago with the business having moved to a new home in Ruckersville in April. That move left the former building empty, creating a situation for the Toy Box to return to its roots.
For years, the organization operated out of the Harley Owners Group (HOG) Parlor on the Waugh property. When it outgrew that space, the Toy Box began utilizing the Gibson Rental building on Byrd Street. That building has since been leased by Ace Hardware, leaving the perfect opportunity for the Toy Box to return to Waugh, this time in the main showroom taking up the entire space.
“My dad [the late Waugh Harley-Davidson owner Don Waugh] has been gone almost seven years now,” Waugh-Robinson said. “He would have loved [the Toy Box] being on the showroom floor. He was always so proud of the Toy Box. He was such a big kid and loved Christmas.”
The showroom was used as a drop-off point for toys, with all donations eventually filtering into the building. Toy donations are separated into age groups for female and male children before being “shopped” by volunteers Wednesday evening. Volunteers take turns picking items from the tables for the families, bagging them up to be added to bags of items the organization purchased earlier in the week at the Locust Grove Walmart using donated funds. The items are then distributed throughout the county to the families’ homes that Saturday by volunteers. This year, the organization served 700 children ages 0-17 among 300 families. All donations stay within Orange County.
“We have hundreds of volunteers between shopping, packing and delivering,” Waugh-Robinson said. “I love our community that continues to support us. All of our stuff stays local and 99% of all funds raised go to the recipients.”
Some of those volunteers include Waugh-Robinson’s daughters, Elliott and Lily, who have been volunteering with the organization since they were children. Sydney Amos has also been involved since she was a child and her mother, Dana Amos, serves as the organization’s vice president. Rachel Gibson is the secretary and Evie Woods is the treasurer.
“I couldn’t do it without them,” Waugh-Robinson said.
Several local businesses play a large part in making the Toy Box a success. Waugh-Robinson said Gibson Rental still played a major part in the organization, loaning tables and chairs and utilizing its staff and box truck to transport items.
“They were amazing,” she said.
Other local businesses contributed as well, with toy collection sites set up at Orange Tire, Village Motorsports, the Unionville Dollar General, Farm Credit, Jack Samuels Realty, Pig Out, Iron Pipe, Orange Chiropractic and the Lake of the Woods Clubhouse. Local Macmillan distribution partner, MPS, donated dozens of books and handled copying services for the Toy Box, making multiple copies of its forms.
“That’s a huge donation on their part,” Waugh-Robinson said.
The Toy Box also received grants from the William Cooke Foundation and Walmart, as well as the Bama Works Fund of the Dave Matthews Band. Waugh-Robinson said the $7,000 Bama Works grant went toward funding Food Lion restricted gift cards for the families. Restricted gift cards cannot be used for tobacco, alcohol, lottery purchases or other gift cards. Each family received $35 to Food Lion with larger families receiving two cards.
“Those are handed to adults at drop off,” Waugh-Robinson said. “They are so appreciative of those. There’s a lot of food insecurity in our community. I don’t know if people realize it.”
Walmart is also a great partner, Waugh-Robinson said, in terms of shopping, offering breakfast snacks and dedicated employees when volunteers descend on the store to shop early Monday morning.
And although the local HOG Chapter is no longer active, Waugh-Robinson said several of the former members still volunteer with the Toy Box. The Rotary Club of Orange and the Orange Free Clinic also participated, creating bags of toothbrushes, toothpaste and dental floss for each child, as well as information about the clinic’s services.
As the Toy Box wraps up its 2025 year and children unwrap their presents, work will soon begin on the 2026 operation. The board will meet in January to go over the recent year’s successes, discuss possible tweaks and start preliminary planning for next Christmas.
For those interested in learning more about the Orange County Children’s Toy Box, visit occtoybox.org.
