Original Short-Form Video Series Sets This Network Apart

Thomas Torrey is too young to remember the Vietnam War. In fact he was born six years after the U.S. withdrew the last of its troops from Saigon in 1975. But after reading a book about the Vietnam era, Torrey discovered a difficult truth about the war’s legacy.

“My eyes were opened to the hardship that our Vietnam veterans endured upon their homecoming,” the Connecticut-born filmmaker says.

Torrey is in a unique position. As Vice President of Short Form Programming for the INSP Network, he has the creative freedom to develop projects with emotional punch. Thus, when he set out to write and direct his first script for the network’s series of short, inspirational public service videos called “Moments,” he drew upon this newfound knowledge about the war. The result was Thank You For Your Service, the story of a chance encounter in a small town coffee shop between a humble Vietnam veteran and a young soldier in uniform.

The video has been viewed more than 1.6 million times on YouTube, and has been embraced by a wide variety of veterans and military groups, including the American Legion and League of POW/MIA Families. It has been shown on the Jumbotron at a Houston Astros game, and on the syndicated talk show The View.

“We had no idea the national impact the video would make,” says Torrey, who lives in South Carolina, where INSP is based. “We continue to feel a great sense of gratitude at the lives it’s touching.”

Touching lives is one of the main objectives of the Moments series, now in its third year of production. With more than 80 original videos that “celebrate love, faith, valor, and other timeless truths in action,” the series is designed to help the INSP Network, which is owned by Inspiration Ministries, establish an identity among Christian TV networks. The spots are one to three minutes in length and appear throughout the day between reruns of shows such as Little House on the Prairie and The Waltons. Topics include adoption, homelessness, social justice, poverty, and religious freedom. Some of the videos are scripted, while others are documentaries or interviews with well-known figures.

In addition to airing on the network, the videos can be seen on the Moments Channel on YouTube and online at Moments.org. The series has won several industry awards and helped INSP finish number 1 year-over-year in ratings growth in 2013 among all networks measured by Nielsen.

Torrey is quick to acknowledge Senior Vice President Jim Goss for green-lighting Thank You For Your Service immediately after reading the script. Goss is a Vietnam era veteran.

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