Bruce Layne has lived the proverbial American Dream. Born in Los Angeles, California, Bruce moved to Las Vegas, Nevada when he was only ten years old and the city had only 25,000 people! Bruce attended Bishop Gorman High School and UNLV graduating with a degree in economics. He worked several jobs during his high school and college years, but always made time to play his favorite sport: baseball, at which he excelled with an amazing batting average of 631.

After graduating, Bruce worked his way up in the insurance business and with nothing more than hard work, commitment and perseverance, he managed to create the largest private insurance brokerage in Nevada. Layne and Associates insured many of the major hotels and casinos in Las Vegas.

Being a successful businessman was one thing, but Bruce's natural curiosity led him to try his hand at politics- running for Lt. Governor in 1998 During the campaign, Bruce ran on the slogan "Our number one asset is quality education." Not being content to just talk about changing the education system, Bruce decided to do something about it, and so founded "Career Day" at the local schools. One day, while he was visiting the school to speak to the students on Career Day, he learned the teachers didn't have adequate funding to procure all the supplies they needed for their classrooms. Bruce personally pledged each teacher the monies they needed to make up the difference.

It is because of his reputation for being generous, while at the same time having strong business ethics, that Bruce was appointed Vice Chair to the Nevada State Athletic Commission by Governor Bob Miller.
Bruce was also named a distinguished alumnus and was the first alumni to serve on the UNLV Foundation Board. Over the years, Bruce also served on the Nevada Economic Education Council, as a Board member of the Nevada Development Authority, the Nevada Dance Theatre and the Southern Nevada Clean Communities as well as being a member of the Association of Professional Insurance Agents.

After deciding to retire and selling his insurance company, Bruce figured figured his days would be filled playing golf with his sons Chad and Trevor, watching his wife Sherry compete her Arabian horses and playing with his grandkids Maddie and Garrett Bruce. But life had other plans for Bruce and on April 26, 1999, he was diagnosed with Parkinson's. After moping about for a few days, Bruce decided to do something about it. He wrote a book called "My Gift" about his life and his battle with Parkinson's. The response to Bruce's book was so overwhelming, that Bruce knew he needed to do more.

Bruce jumped into the Parkinson's community and learned all he could about how he could best help. He spoke to researchers and doctors who all told him that what they needed was a digital library- a place where they could share data. Bruce realized that it was only through collaboration and sharing that all the pieces to the Parkinson's puzzle could be assembled to find the cure.

But Bruce also realized that patients and caregivers were an important part of the equation. Bruce decided to create the eLayne Library as a place for patients, caregivers, doctors and researchers to all come together in one website to share as much data, both clinical and experiential as possible.


Bruce invites you to join him in the battle against Parkinson's at   eLayneLibrary.org