Ernest Whitington (1873 – 13 April 1934) was a journalist in South Australia, who as "Rufus" wrote the popular Out among the People column in the Register and The Advertiser when those two newspapers were amalgamated.
Ernest was educated at Whinham College, and his first job was with the Register as an office boy, but quickly impressed his fellow workers with his writing ability and personality.
Under the nom de plume "Rufus",[a] Whitington began his column "Out among the People"; a miscellany of wittily told anecdotes, with liberal helpings of nostalgia and popular history, about all sorts of local identities, famous and obscure, but always engaging, as though these people were all friends, which they probably were.
The Great Depression was squeezing business, and The Advertiser, long a major shareholder, in February 1931 absorbed the Register.
[2][3] "Out among the People" continued as a popular column, written or edited by "Vox" – Maurice Stephen Fisher (1887–1968).