Shane,

I had the exact same problem and posted a question here.

A response from Noel Claudio suggested an updated Help compiler. Find it at:

ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/softlib/mslfiles/hcwsetup.exe

I'm going to try it. It may work for you too.

HTH
>I am unable to an RTF file in Word 97 and compile into a help file using HC31.EXE. The help compiler returns the following error:
>............................
>Scanning file test.rtf for compression .................
>Error 4639. Error in file 'test.rtf' at byte offset 0X472E3.
>
>If I save the same RTF file in Word 6 everything works ok. Has anyone had any problems creating help files from RTF files saved in Word 97?
>
>Thanks for the help,
>Shane