Born and educated in Wisconsin at Lawrence College, Lydia Augusta Sanborn moved to Lansing in 1871 to teach at the Franklin and Townsend Street Schools. Three years later she married James Appleyard, an English-born widower with three children, who superintended our Capitol’s construction.

Motherhood, membership in the Lansing Woman’s club and the St. Mary’s Church, and volunteer work kept Augusta busy. In 1896 (the same year James died), she was elected inaugural president of the nonsectarian Lansing women’s Hospital Association. Determined to care for the capital city’s sick and ailing, the women acquired the DeViney home on Ottawa St., hired staff, and began accepting patients. The humble institution evolved into Sparrow Hospital, a leading mid-Michigan healthcare provider that is now part of the University of Michigan Medical System.

Appleyard’s family was likely from England.