author
J. A. (Joseph Allen) Costello
1854–1943
Best known for a vivid 1895 book on the Indigenous peoples of Puget Sound and the Pacific Northwest, this late-19th-century writer left behind a rare regional portrait of stories, customs, and daily life. He also worked as a newspaperman and later in Seattle's comptroller's office.
1 Audiobook
The Siwash, Their Life, Legends, and Tales: Puget Sound and Pacfic Northwest
by J. A. (Joseph Allen) Costello
About the author
Born in 1854 and dying in 1943, Joseph Allen Costello is remembered chiefly for The Siwash: Their Life, Legends and Tales: Puget Sound and Pacific Northwest, published in Seattle in 1895. The book gathered descriptions of Native life and legend in the Northwest and has remained the work most closely associated with his name.
Archival records from the University of Washington describe him not only as an author but also as a newsman and an employee in Seattle's comptroller's office. That mix of journalism, civic work, and regional writing helps explain the practical, local focus of the work he is known for.
Readers approaching Costello today may find him most interesting as a window into how people in the Pacific Northwest wrote about the region in the late 1800s. His surviving reputation rests less on a large body of books than on one distinctive volume that preserved stories and observations tied to Puget Sound and its surrounding communities.