Slim Dusty saw major metropolitan music radio stations abandon support for country artists, and despite record sales in the multimillions, after the 1950s, Dusty was rarely heard on-air outside regional centres in Australia. Dusty's 1957 hit "A Pub with No Beer" was the biggest-selling record by an Australian to that time, the first Australian single to go gold and the first and only 78 rpm record to be awarded a gold disc. (The "Pub with No Beer" is a real place, in Taylors Arm, not far from Kempsey where Slim was born.) In 1959 and 1960, Dutch and German cover versions of
Australian of the Year Herald knows the selection board will look closely at the 2016 process and work to improve public confidence in the awards in time for a better Australia Day in 2017". While the selection of a single Australian of the Year is bound to stimulate debate, the awards program as a whole recognises a much wider range of achievement. In 1979 the NADC named its first 'Young Australian of the Year', community service volunteer Julie Sochacki. Twenty years later the veteran country music star Slim Dusty received the inaugural 'Senior Australian of the Year' award. In 2003 the NADC introduced an