Debra Toney Capps

Debra “Debbie” Toney Capps (October 5, 1953 to March 30, 2024) lived a beautiful and vibrant life. A loving, generous, and outgoing woman of exquisite taste, Debbie provided mentoring, comfort, and solace to all while asking little in return.  

Debbie was born in Roanoke, Virginia, and spent her childhood days in Rocky Mount, Virginia. She graduated from Franklin County High School in 1972 before enrolling at Virginia Tech later that fall. She received her undergraduate degree in Elementary Education with distinction in June 1976 and later received a master’s degree in education, with a specialty in Curriculum and Instruction, in March 1981.  All degrees were conferred by Virginia Tech.

While attending Virginia Tech, she met her eventual husband and soul mate Oral “Jug” Capps, Jr at a Kappa Sigma fraternity party on April 12, 1973. Neither Debbie nor Jug had ever attended a fraternity party previously.  Subsequently after a courtship of three years, they were married on June 12, 1976, at Doe Run Christian Church in Rocky Mount, Virginia. Upon graduation from Virginia Tech, Debbie began a career as a prolific and beloved elementary school teacher that spanned the period 1976 to 1981. Beginning in September 1981, Debbie devoted her life as a dedicated mother to her sons Kevin William Capps and Eric Thomas Capps. She was heavily involved in the communities of Christiansburg, Virgina from 1979 to 1986 and College Station, Texas from 1986 to 2020.  Her motto was “bloom where you are planted.” Debbie never met a stranger because she quickly turned every stranger into a friend.  She had the uncanny ability to get to know everyone and interact with them, with a heart of genuine empathy and love.

Debbie served as President of the Republican Women’s Club in Brazos County. She provided leadership to the party and interacted with many prominent conservatives, notably Greg Abbott, Rick Perry, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush as well as various local leaders. She was fiercely engaged in various political campaigns. In addition, Debbie was a member of the College Station Noon Lions Club.

Debbie and Jug were survivors of the attack on our country on September 11, 2001, at the World Trade Center in New York City. As a result of that event, she devoted herself to firefighters, particularly Engine 3, Ladder 12, Battalion 7 of the FDNY who helped get she and Jug to safety.  Debbie and Jug brought members of that firehouse, who lost five of their own on 9/11, to the Bryan/ College Station area numerous times to attend various events from 2002 to 2019. Likewise, Debbie along with friends and family, were always welcome at the firehouse located in the Chelsea area of lower Manhattan. She and Jug are honorary members of the firehouse. Debbie and Jug established the Capps Family Firefighters Education Foundation in 2002, and she was involved heavily with the Brayton Fire School at Texas A&M University.   

Debbie loved to travel, particularly to New York City and to Las Vegas. She adored Broadway shows, attending 75 of them. Debbie was the queen of Texas Hold’Em and enjoyed various slot machine games. At the tables when the cards began to fall Debbie would wish all the players well saying in her cherry voice “good luck everybody.”   Debbie was an avid sports fan. The teams that she particularly rooted for were the Texas Aggies and the Baltimore Orioles. She was known by all who knew her as a devout Christian and loving wife and mother as well as a loyal, unselfish, and esteemed member of the Bryan/College Station community.

Debbie is survived by her husband Jug, and her sons Kevin and Eric, as well as close friends Marla and Cal Calvin and “adopted daughter” Loren Burns. She is reunited with her father and hero, William Lee Toney, her grandmother Else Mae Hunt, her grandfather Benjamin Ammon Hunt, and her aunt Dean Shell among others.