Dayton Area's Second Hindu Temple Dedicated

May 7, 2007

Author: Thomas Gnau

Source: Dayton Daily News

http://www.daytondailynews.com/n/content/oh/story/news/local/2007/05/07/ddn050707temple.html

HUBER HEIGHTS — It began with a Hindu family's prayers in the privacy of their Springfield home in the early 1980s.

It culminated this weekend in the dedication of the Dayton area's second Hindu temple, off Bellefontaine Road. The first temple, in Beavercreek, was dedicated in 1985.

In between was the journey of a lifetime for Chirag Patel, a Hindu believer and Columbus physician.

In 1982 the Patel family began what led to this weekend's two-day dedication. By 1984, a dozen reform-sect Hindu families around Dayton were opening their homes for weekly prayer services, he said.

Patel was just 5 years old then. From there, the group grew to 125 families willing to transform a former fraternal lodge into a Hindu Mandir, or house of worship.