Have you been playing with TweakUI? See
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=284896 "'Most recently used' list missing
from File menu and 'Recently used file list' option unavailable in Office XP
and 2003".

"hhs" wrote:

My "Open Recent Documents" Icon is disabled in Word. How can I fix it?
It also does not appear on my start menu. Is there a windows download or
something that may fix it?

thanks!