HOw to obtain System 7, System 6 Apple software from Apple
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Last updated Jan 20 2011 - (c) 2011 Herb Johnson 

Apple keeps their oldest old Macintosh programs, including disk images 
System 6.0.8, System 7.0 and System 7.5.3, as compressed disk image files
in their Web archives at

http://www.info.apple.com/support/oldersoftwarelist.html

and also in various directories (folders) at:

http://download.info.apple.com/Apple_Support_Area/Apple_Software_Updates/English-North_American/Macintosh

It's a challenge to find and download them, decompress them, and create the original 
disks. Finding them is of course the first step, the locations are above, or 
on various Mac archive sites, or you may find them via a Web search. Downloading them
is tricky because modern OS's like Windows or OS X may be confused by either the
file formats, or not be able to decompress and/or "process" them.

Second, many of the files are compressed, either using a hex format .hex,
or using a Stuffit compression scheme .sit . See my notes below about "Stuffit",
a commercial program that's been around for a long time.

Third, the uncompressed files are disk images, which must either be
written to real diskettes or loaded on the (System 7) Desktop as virtual
diskettes. See my notes below about "Disk Copy", an Apple utility.

More discussion of this kind of work can be found at:

http://lowendmac.com/brierley/08pb/classic-mac-boot-floppy.html

An Apple article about "Software downloads: Formats and common error 
messages"

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4414

...and other Web sites have documents about this process. 

Stuffit Expander
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I have not done it in some time, but "Stuffit Expander" may be needed to 
decompress these .bin or .sit files. Links to current versions (OS X, Windows)
are at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StuffIt_Expander

but to get an OS 7 version you may have to root around, search the Web. I found 
something here early in 2011:

http://net68000.freeshell.org/stuffitexpander5.html
http://www.jagshouse.com/7.1.html

Disk Copy
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Disk image files are created and accessed  using Disk Copy 6.3 under
System 7; and under older versions of Disk Copy (like version 4)
for System 6. Disk Copy  reads and writes disk image files, 
creates "virtual" diskettes and reads and writes actual diskettes.
This is best done under  System 7.0 or 7.5 or OS 8 with Disk Copy 6.3.3.

http://download.info.apple.com/Apple_Support_Area/Apple_Software_Updates/

then go to the subdirectory (folder) 

English-North_American/Macintosh/Utilities/Disk_Copy/

to get Disk Copy.

That's all I have. Sorry the situation is a mess, but that's just how it 
is, given this software and operating systems are DECADES old.

Herb Johnson