Saving Old Mails From Aol 3.0

[guest_CHRIS]

Hello,

recently, after heavy searching I discovered my old backups from 2001. It contains the folder called "organize" from my AOL account I used between 1996 and 2001 (sofware was AOL 3.0 up to 5.0 I guess..).
There are some very interesting mails in that file with my according screenname and I'd wish to save them and put them into e.g. a readable .rtf file.

The Problem:

I installed the old AOL 3.0 version from my old WIN 98 disc on a Virtual Machine.
Copied the old "organize" folder into the according place and replaced thereby the default "organize", yet empty folder.

Then I launched AOL.
Well, I do not use AOL anymore, hence I did not have a screen name.
AOL 3.0 denied opening the "read mail" folder as well as the organizer where I could have found the wanted mails.

Question:

What can I do to save those old mails?
Can I trick the software so it will allow me to open my old mails through it?
Can the organizer file be used by any other program than EDITOR or WORD PAD (both show a rather cryptic lisiting of the contained data and it is a heck of work to copy and paste the wanted mails, not to speak of ranking options by name or date...)?

I do NOT want to set up a new AOL account just to get a screenname, if that would help at all...

Thank you
CHRIS

[Dan998]

CHRIS, the same thing happened to me, except I have compuserve.
Compuserve is owned by Aol.
Its basically the same setup as Aol.
I have a backup hard drive.
I copied the organize folder in the D drive.
Then you just paste the old Organize folder which is in the D drive over the new Organize folder, which you get when you download either Aol or Compuserve.
When you had Aol from 96 to 2001.
Do you remember your aol screen names.
I think you have to paste and copy the organize folder with the same screen names.
When you go to reinstall Aol, it will ask are you a current member or do you want to keep the old screen names you had.
Did you get Aol again and get new Screen names after 2001.
Or you didn't use Aol after 2001.
Suppose you didn't use Aol after 2001.
Your old Aol Screen names are on Aol's site.
You can still get them, then just paste and copy the old organize folder into the new one.
Get Back