Final years and death
Binder became editor of Space World magazine, a move that ended in bankruptcy in the early 1960s. As he recalled in 1974:
"I'm far from retired, simply because I can't afford it. All the money I made from the Marvels and had saved up went down the drain when, in 1960, I invested as junior partner in publishing Space World, a magazine about astronomics ... I think it was a good job I did as editor-in-chief—although the public stayed away from it in droves ... A loss every month on low sales. The mag lasted some 16 issues, during which time Bill Woolfolk and I had put in more money—I mortgaged my house—all paid up by Cap—and borrowed, etc., but we never got the lucky break. So that left me without money reserves, and it was back to the comics until 1967, when my daughter—our only child—was killed by a car at age 14. For reasons difficult to explain, my wife and I moved from Englewood, New Jersey, to upstate New York where Jack lived. I was pretty broken up and found it difficult to write again up here, but went back to sci-fi, this time as the market hit.[30]"
Otto Binder's daughter Mary, had been on her way to school one morning when a car jumped the curb, went into the driveway in front of the school, and killed her.[31][32] As film producer and comics historian Michael Uslan, a family friend, recalled, "Otto never recovered. His wife never recovered. She had a breakdown, and Otto started drinking, and eventually he dropped dead of a heart attack. And the three of them were gone, like in a flash."[31] Binder recalled in a 1972 history of comics, that after his daughter's death
"... we finally made up our minds to 'start a new life.' When we moved to upstate New York in 1969, I quit DC and comics entirely and went back into the sci-fi paperback field. Curtis Books bought seven of my books in a row, including a few oldies, and Belmont issued another half a dozen. I began selling 'gothics' besides a batch of flying saucer books and articles for Saga magazine.[32]"
In 1973, Binder worked for Vincent Fago's Pendulum Press, adapting classic science-fiction stories into comic book format, including Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, The Time Machine, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and The Mysterious Island.
He died in Chestertown, New York, on October 13, 1974, leaving behind, counted Bridwell, "almost 50,000 pages of comics" comprising "over 1,300 scripts for Fawcett" and "more than 2,000 for 20 other publishers", including "some 93 heroes in 198 magazines".[33]
