Help with simple b/w line drawings in Photoshop or Illustrator?

[Sparkly]

I have scanned black-and-white line drawings, but they're old so the paper comes out grey and shadowy (from wrinkles). All I'm trying to do is clean them up and make them sharp black lines on white background.

I have Photoshop and Illustrator and I'm going crazy trying to figure out how to do this one simple thing!!! (The "contrast/brightness" function in Photoshop doesn't clean it up without erasing the lines, and the "outline" tool in Illustrator just makes a mess.)

Can anybody point me in the right direction?

[displacedtexan]

1. In Photoshop...

I click "posterize" to thicken, darken, and smooth lines.

[Sparkly]

2. Thank you!

That helped! :hi:

[SlackJawedYokel]

3. Quick and effective.

Open the file.(make sure its RGB)
Hit Ctrl+L(assuming Windows here) which brings up the Levels control window.
Just below the window that shows the histogram are three sliders, black, gray and white.
Slide the white slider closer to the middle to get rid of the gray and bring the black slider in a touch to darken up the blacks.
Use the middle(gray) slider to even out the tones.

This works for color pics, too.
I usually hit those with a little more saturation aftewards(Ctrl+U).

Good luck.
Cletus