How do I get Win32 to locate DLLs elsewhere (not really a Python thing)?

[Skip Montanaro]

I'm trying for the first time to use Python (2.0) on Win98 with external 
DLLs (GTK/GDK/...).  I installed all the various bits and pieces for 
GIMP/GTK and PyGTK, but three DLLs that come with GIMP/GTK are not where 
Windows is searching for them, so I get import errors.  (GIMP runs 
fine.) Using a tool called the dependency walker (something from MS) I 
am able to extend its module search directories to include C:\Program 
Files\Common Files\GNU so it will resolve those DLLS.

How do I perform that trick so that Microsoft's equivalent of ld.so can 
find them at run-time?  I assume there is some key in the registry I can 
set, but I haven't stumbled on anything obvious so far.  I did extend 
the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Python\PythonCore\2.0 
\PythonPath with the above directory, but that had no discernable 
effect.  I also checked to see what GIMP does.  It has a Path value 
associated with gimp.exe that refers to the DLL-containing directory, so 
I tried adding a string named Path with C:\Program Files\Common 
Files\GNU as its value to python.exe.  That didn't work either.  (Is 
this the equivalent of a Unix environment variable?) Is this another one 
of those "you must reboot for the changes to take effect" things?

Thanks,

unix-weenie-ly y'rs,

Skip Montanaro
skip at pobox.com