Getting out of font changes to plain text, rich text and html

I wanted to copy an e-mail to a file. I asked the option list for a solution. I had three choices, html, plain text and rich text. However, after I successfully downloaded the content into a Word document and printed it, the Reply and Forward commands through my file into one of the three optional modes and sacrifice the thread into a jumble of markers and letters. I can actually see the messages, separate them, but still too many > signs and other confusing bits added in. How can I default back to the original format?