Blast From the Past: Remembering the Real Williamsburg Boom

The Astral Oil Works, which was founded by Charles Pratt (yes, the Pratt Institute Pratt) once sat, roughly, where the Bayside Oil facility near the Bushwick Inlet is today. It is said to have possibly spilled a lot of oil under Williamsburg. One theory holds that some of the oil being found today under the neighborhood could have its origins with spills at the Astral Oil facility. Regardless of the bigger spill theory, however, the Oil Works left an underground legacy in it immediate environs. The Oil Works merged with Standard Oil in 1874. One reminder of the past is the Astral Apartments on Franklin Street in Greenpoint which Pratt built in 1866 as model worker housing. Forgotten-NY provides more good background:

The Astral takes its name from the Astral Oil Works, a refinery built by Charles Pratt in 1867. Astral Oil's slogan was, "the holy lamps of Tibet are primed with Astral Oil." Largess from the oil works was later used to create Pratt Institute, one of NYC's most prestigious art schools, in Bedford-Stuyvesant. Astral made Pratt a multimillionaire, but he later sold to a bigger one, John Rockefeller's Standard Oil.

In any case, the clip below is from the Brooklyn Eagle on January 14, 1880. It details a massive explosion at the Williamsburg Refinery, which was described as "the most terrific explosion which probably ever occurred in Brooklyn...the earth within a mile and a half quivered..."