Claude for Journalists: Source Memory That Doesn't Vanish Between Sessions

Published June 2026 · 5 min read

Journalism is source-dense work. You're tracking forty contacts across three beats. You know which PR person to call for fast turnaround at each agency. You've built context on five ongoing investigations over eighteen months. You have notes on who to trust, who checks out, who has an agenda.

Then you open Claude to help draft a story or work through an angle — and you're re-explaining the cast of characters from scratch. Stash fixes that. It's a lightweight MCP connector that holds your source profiles, beat context, and story notes so Claude is briefed before you start.

What journalists store in Stash

Common collections:

• sources — name, beat relevance, reliability notes, contact method, lead time, relationship context
• beats — background context, key players, ongoing threads, regulatory landscape
• stories — live story context, what you know vs. what you're trying to confirm, who's talking
• investigations — long-running context: documents obtained, timelines, gaps still to fill
• organisations — background on companies, agencies, or institutions you cover regularly
• contacts — PR and comms contacts: who handles what, how fast they respond, what they'll say off-record

This isn't your notes app or CMS. It's the thinking layer — the context that makes Claude useful for working through a story instead of asking you to explain who everyone is.

A session without Stash vs. with Stash

Without Stash (health policy beat):

You: Help me angle the story on the NHS staffing data drop.
Claude: Happy to help. What's the context — what did the data show?
        Who are the key voices on NHS staffing?
        Is there a previous story this follows on from?
        What's the political angle currently?

With Stash:

You: Help me angle the story on the NHS staffing data drop.
Claude: Given your beat context — the ongoing vacancy crisis narrative, the NHSE
        comms team's tendency to front-load positive numbers, and Dr. Anand's
        quote from March about structural vs. cyclical shortfall — the strongest
        angle is probably the gap between the headline vacancy rate and the
        regional distribution data. Here's how I'd frame it:...

That's the difference between Claude as a typing aid and Claude as a genuine thinking partner for your beat.

Useful patterns for working journalists

Source reliability notes

After each interaction with a source, add a brief note. Over time you build a calibrated picture:

search sources for "NHS data accuracy"

Claude surfaces which of your contacts have been reliable on NHS statistics specifically — not just generally trustworthy.

Investigation thread tracking

Long-running investigations have a lot of "we know X, still need Y" structure. Store it in Stash so you can pick up exactly where you left off:

search investigations for "planning corruption thread"

"Start my day" for journalists

context() — what's live on my beats and what's outstanding on the
three stories I'm working this week?

Pre-interview prep

search sources for "Riverside Council communications"
"I'm interviewing their head of planning tomorrow about the housing numbers.
What do I know about this person and what should I push on?"

What to watch out for

Don't store anything that could identify a protected source in detail — Stash is a cloud service and while your data is isolated to your account, the same judgement you'd apply to any cloud notes tool applies here. Source-sensitive material belongs in an end-to-end encrypted system.

Stash is well-suited for: beat context, background research, non-sensitive source notes, story angles, organisational profiles. Not for: protected source identities, embargoed material before publication, legally sensitive documents.

Free tier is sufficient for most journalists

A beat journalist with 80 source profiles, 20 beat context records, and 10 live story contexts is around 110 records — well within the free tier (2,500 records, 50 queries/month).

If you're running multiple investigations simultaneously or covering multiple beats with dense source networks, Pro (£8/month) gives you room to grow. Pricing may change; cancel anytime.

Setup takes three minutes

1. Sign in at stashlite.com — Google OAuth
2. Copy your connector URL
3. Claude → Settings → Integrations → Add MCP server → paste URL
4. Type context() in a new conversation — Claude prompts you to add your first source