Program needed for opening emails

[Beth G]

I use Microsoft Outlook 97 to collect my emails. Most
emails I have not been able to open as the email message
comes as an attachment/ My computer says I need the
program aol.exe in order to open these files. Does anyone
know how I can download this file without downloading
AOL? (I don't use AOL and don't want the entire AOL
program on my drive)

Thanks