The program features live interviews and stories that are compiled by the ABC's rural reporters who are based at each regional station.
[1] John Douglass, an agricultural scientist with some international radio experience, convinced ABC management to establish a specialist rural department.
The ABC agreed and Douglass was subsequently appointed to lead the new department as "Federal Director of Rural Broadcasts".
Stories that had been planned for the first few weeks of The Country Hour included coverage of stock sales at Homebush; an interview with a Pheasant enthusiast; an educational piece about a poultry factory; and an account of haymaking at Hawkesbury Agricultural College.
In 1951, the Victorian edition of The Country Hour broke the news of the decision to introduce the Myxoma virus into Australia in a bid to control the wild rabbit population, after Ian Clunies Ross told rural reporter Graham White about the plan.
[10] In 1988, Tasmanian Country Hour presenter Tom Murrell won a Pater bicentennial media award, sponsored by the Australian Academy of Broadcast Arts and Sciences for Best Rural Radio Program for a 10-minute feature documenting the increase in Japanese tourism and how Tasmanian farmers could benefit from the boom.