Isolated, they tapped on walls to communicate with each other in the beginning.
Later, with a little more freedom granted, they played bridge together, shared some of the rotating Sunday chaplain duties and encouraged each other with the recitations from movies, books and poetry.
The memories, now half a century old, are still fresh in John Fer’s mind as he recalled life in the North Vietnamese prison camp with John McCain and others who were held captive for several years.