diff --git a/lib/chibi/mime-test.sld b/lib/chibi/mime-test.sld
index 8091f769..87ae6d2e 100644
--- a/lib/chibi/mime-test.sld
+++ b/lib/chibi/mime-test.sld
@@ -144,5 +144,10 @@ Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary
 --BbC04y--
 --AaB03x--
 "))))
-
+      (test "text/html; charset=utf-8"
+          (mime-type-from-extension "html"))
+      (test "text/plain; charset=utf-8"
+          (mime-type-from-extension "scm"))
+      (test #f
+          (mime-type-from-extension "foo"))
       (test-end))))
diff --git a/lib/chibi/mime.scm b/lib/chibi/mime.scm
index ec3a5858..a782aac4 100644
--- a/lib/chibi/mime.scm
+++ b/lib/chibi/mime.scm
@@ -21,6 +21,20 @@
   (cond ((and (pair? ls) (pair? (car ls)) (assq key ls)) => cdr)
         (else (and (pair? o) (car o)))))
 
+;; most of these are plain text for easier viewing in the browser
+(define (mime-type-from-extension ext)
+  (assq-ref
+   '((htm . "text/html; charset=utf-8")
+     (html . "text/html; charset=utf-8")
+     (scm . "text/plain; charset=utf-8")
+     (sld . "text/plain; charset=utf-8")
+     (c . "text/plain; charset=utf-8")
+     (h . "text/plain; charset=utf-8")
+     (txt . "text/plain; charset=utf-8")
+     (org . "text/plain; charset=utf-8")
+     (md . "text/plain; charset=utf-8"))
+   (and (string? ext) (string->symbol ext))))
+
 ;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
 ;; simple matching instead of regexps
 
diff --git a/lib/chibi/mime.sld b/lib/chibi/mime.sld
index 0ac13681..42844bc4 100644
--- a/lib/chibi/mime.sld
+++ b/lib/chibi/mime.sld
@@ -2,7 +2,8 @@
 (define-library (chibi mime)
   (export assq-ref mime-header-fold mime-headers->list
           mime-parse-content-type mime-decode-header
-          mime-message-fold mime-message->sxml mime-write-headers)
+          mime-message-fold mime-message->sxml mime-write-headers
+          mime-type-from-extension)
   (import (scheme base) (scheme char) (scheme write)
           (chibi base64) (chibi quoted-printable)
           (chibi string))
diff --git a/lib/chibi/net/http-server.scm b/lib/chibi/net/http-server.scm
index 3cb2c110..7563f80e 100644
--- a/lib/chibi/net/http-server.scm
+++ b/lib/chibi/net/http-server.scm
@@ -129,8 +129,13 @@
 (define (http-send-file request path)
   (cond
    ((file-exists? path)
-    (servlet-respond request 200 "OK")
-    (send-file path (request-out request)))
+    (let ((headers
+           (cond
+            ((mime-type-from-extension (path-extension path))
+             => (lambda (type) `((Content-Type . ,type))))
+            (else '()))))
+      (servlet-respond request 200 "OK" headers)
+      (send-file path (request-out request))))
    (else
     (servlet-respond request 404 "Not Found"))))