after a sudo make install and deleting a few old directories, I ran dosemu
-t and then ran insfdusr. I was told that no user space existed so exited
out of dosemu and went into the ~/builds/install-freedos-master/src
directory and ran freedos-installuserspace.
The downloads from the ibiblio archive happened and were successful.
Next dosemu -t and I find 6 directories on c: tmp was the only directory
earlier and I got a bin directory and doc and help and they're populated
with files.
install-freedos-master ought to go into dosemu with documentation so
things aren't so biforcated in the future.