Apache 1.3.34 Server on Kubuntu - index.html file permissions?
 

I recently set up a network address and server with the Kubuntu Apache 1.3.34 package and the magic of DynDNS; I am new to the server game, but I was able to copy an index.html file into my /var/www directory and the page was served fine. Now I have problems; thank you in advance for reading and possibly helping.

I went to edit the page last night, and suddenly I was getting "Error 403: Forbidden, you don't have access to / on this server." My edits were minimal, and I even reverted back to the original file, but I still recieved these errors. I finally set the /var/www (and all contents) permissions to 755 (user=root; group=root), but I have a feeling that this may not be correct. Is this safe?

Also, my index.html file had two embedded images/code snippits -- one was a link to a favorite UserFriendly.org cartoon (the actual cartoon appeared on my page), and one was a localized weather report from www.weatherforyou.com, which makes new images based on the weather, which mypage then loads. The weather report and the cartoon now both appear as "broken link/images" (you know, the empty box with a ripped paper saying it cannot be found or loaded). When I click on the weather report, I am sent to the WeatherForYou local report, but the embedded image/code (which hasn't changed) no longer works. As I said, I even reverted back to my original index.html file, but no success.

Yes, I stopped and restarted Apache. At one point i rebooted to make sure it was a freshly-running process.

What are my safe permissions for this folder and file?
Who should own them -- root? (currently root)
What should the group ownership be? (currently root)
And why are embedded images not working?