Large samples of papers published in theJournal of Biological Chemistry in all decades and in some mid-decades werechecked in order to study the referencing pattern, throughout the period 1910–1985, in an internationally leading journal, with especially high “citation impact”. All measures show that there has been a significant growth in the number of references per paper, during most of the period, but mainly from the 1950's on, refuting Meadows' “upper limit”. A detailed comparison to a wide range of fields shows theJBC rates to be among the highest. Eight factors affecting the number of references are discussed, and some projections for the future are made.