Thank you for the link, Stefan, it's very informative and I'll use it to explore the corresponding actions in Word 2008.

A friend and fellow writer here told me something I didn't know (and that I accept as true because I have no reason not to), that Word will embed images up to a certain size but links to them in another location if the files are over a certain size. The images that disappeared were not high resolution and therefore relatively small, but she suggested that I may have moved the files from their location when inserted, and Word can't find them.

I haven't intentionally moved anything, but I decided to reinsert the images. I have no explanation for what happened, but after I inserted the first one, the others "filled in" on their own. What caused them to disappear remains a mystery, but the "crisis" has been averted, at least for the moment.

I appreciate your taking the time to assist me, thanks again.

Tosh