On October 21, 1924, Standard Oil of New Jersey research worker Ernest Oelgert startled fellow employees by shrieking that three figures were "coming at him." Oelgert, working on a pilot program to develop a commercial technique for manufacturing tetraethyl lead, appeared panic-stricken and gasped for air. He was taken by ambulance to the industrial-disease clinic at Reconstruction Hospital in New York City.

In the next two days, several other Bayway workers exhibited similar symptoms. Later that week, after Oelgert died, the New York Times ran a page-one article headlined "Odd Gas Kills One, Makes Four Insane." Then one of the stricken workers, William McSweeney, threatened his sister with violence and had to be removed from his home in a straightjacket. Another, William Kresge, hurled himself out of a second-floor window and later died. A third, Walter Dymock died "violently insane" at Reconstruction Hospital ... Thirty-one others remained under observation.

Autopsies revealed that tetraethyl lead had saturated the bloodstreams of the four victims, leading to congestion of the brain, delirium, and death. This condition differed from the lead poisoning that was known to afflict workers in the painting and typesetting trades, and the doctor who attended Ernest Oelgert--at a loss to fully describe what had killed his patient--officially listed the cause of death as "chemical psychosis." Ernest Oelgert, Sr., the victim's father, told reporters his son had been concerned about the early symptoms of his condition before October 21. "Ernest was told by the doctors at the plant that working in the lab wouldn't hurt him. Otherwise he would have quit. They said he'd have to get used to it."

M.D. Mann, head of the Research Division at the Bayway plant, denied that the dead or hospitalized men had in any way been affected by TEL. He acknowledged that the work being carried out was potentially dangerous, but noted that the men were paid a generous bonus for volunteering for it, and that they were issued gas masks for their protection. In a statement issued the day after Oelgert's death, Mann suggested that "these men probably went insane because they worked too hard." Mann himself was soon found to be suffering from TEL poisoning.