Q: How to read old MSWord Apple files with grey square / green "exec" icon ?

I do offer data conversion services.     Dataviz offered Maclinkplus software on Mac OS X 10.6.8 and earlier, which could convert these documents into a more usable format today.   If you can do with a lack of formatting, you may be able to extract these documents with either TextEdit or http://www.barebones.com/ Textwrangler, or http://www.zamzar.com/

So depending on how many documents are bothering you I could see if I could bring it up to Office 2008 formatting.

See my FAQ* on my service rates:

http://www.macmaps.com/techsupport.html

* Links to my pages may give me compensation.

You could also try Libre Office (free download) which recognises a whole lot of ancient formats including Claris Works and may well be able to convert your old Word files. Bear in mind too, that Word itself can read and in many cases convert, its own older formats.