chemurgy

The term chemurgy didn’t last, but the movement presaged the farm policy of coming decades.

That same decade, an upstart movement called farm chemurgy emerged.

Chemurgy was a strange neologism meant to evoke the chemical energy of the farm.

Chemurgy became a way to reconcile the growing tension between modernity and agrarian tradition.

The transformation of agricultural byproducts into industrial resources came to be known as chemurgy, a word coined by an organic chemist with Dow Chemical Co.