Example sentences of "[noun] had [be] [to-vb] [art] [noun sg] " in BNC.
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| 1 | One of the first rules of house and hall parties had been to scout the building for dark corners that might make useful retiring-places if the evening went well — preference was given to anywhere that had a lock on the inside . |
| 2 | Clearly Dorothy 's principal intention had been to record the apple harvest — a prodigious one ; Helen 's presence was incidental , like one of those figures introduced for purposes of scale or composition . |
| 3 | The intention had been to give the premiere of Sea Change at Sadler 's Wells to open the Theatre Ballet 's new season there , but it was thought that by then John would already have left for New York to take part in the Sadler 's Wells Ballet 's first American tour , so the decision was made to present the ballet first on 18 July 1949 at the Gaiety Theatre , Dublin , where the company concluded its summer tour . |
| 4 | Godard 's intention had been to accompany the reading with its author descending stairs , naked , in order to confront the viewer , it was assumed , with the contrast between argument , theory , and the sexual objectification of women . |
| 5 | His constitutional plan had been to secure the election of his son , the young Frederick , as king , but as soon as the emperor was known to be dead the wisdom of upholding the election of so young an heir was questioned . |
| 6 | It was not so much a guidance note as a review ; the Committee 's terms of reference had been to consider the design and layout most appropriate to various types of roads in built-up areas , with due regard to safety , the free Mow of road traffic , economy and the requirements of town planning , and to make recommendations . |
| 7 | In an end-of-year assessment at Westminster , Mr Ashdown admitted that when he became leader , his job had been to stabilise a party ‘ in a fast downward spiral of disintegration ’ . |
| 8 | He added that the MBR 's task at the time of the coup had been to establish the basis " for a profound transformation … in the juridical-political and socio-economic areas " . |
| 9 | One of Chaovalit 's many Cabinet responsibilities had been to head the government 's Counter Corruption Commission ( CCC ) . |
| 10 | One major American aim at the conference had been to limit the power of the Japanese , who since their victories over China in 1895 and over Russia in 1905 , had made increasing demands on China . |
| 11 | The initial objective of the ITE initiative had been to encourage a reorientation of the work supported by ITAB into avenues of relevance to the engineering community , using the existing committee structure as far as possible . |
| 12 | In establishing a Peace Council the aim had been to create a body composed of representatives of associations , political parties , the private sector and the government to design a new peace strategy . |
| 13 | This act left him with an interest in the company that was for most practical purposes worthless since the previous practice among the three member-directors had been to take the money out of the firm in the form of directors ' fees rather than shareholders ' dividends . |
| 14 | The usual way of coping with their father had been to make no reference to anything untoward that might have happened , for fear of bringing it all upon them again . |
| 15 | If the objective of his policy had been to maintain a balance of power by opposing the strongest nation in Europe , he was no doubt picking the wrong enemy ; France was the rising power , and later in the century English policy was devoted to holding her in check . |
| 16 | The 17-member Co-Ordinating Committee on Multilateral Export Controls ( COCOM ) , the body whose main role had been to regulate the sale of Western technology to communist countries , agreed in Paris on June 1-2 to invite the former Soviet republics to join its newly established COCOM Co-Operation Forum on Export Controls . |
| 17 | I recall that two years ago at the NFT he announced that his great ambition as a young man had been to become a movie director : now ( aided by director of photography William Lubtchansky and production designer Chloe Obolensky ) he has made a landmark television film . |
| 18 | All that scuffling had been to move an armchair round to the front of the desk . |
| 19 | He retorted that the choice had been to close the paper and he wished he had done that because it would have been remembered as a decent publication . |
| 20 | A captured guerrilla said that the aim of the attack had been to undermine the visit of Pope Jean-Paul II which was due in early September [ see p. 37732 ] . |
| 21 | Considering the effects of language on delicate sensibilities , John Mortimer — whose main concern had been to keep the Sex Pistols as far away from court as possible — pondered that the word Maidenhead did not appear to cause the inhabitants of that town any problems . |
| 22 | The application was renewed to the full court ( Taylor L.J. , Waterhouse and Kennedy JJ. ) on 5 March 1992 and was granted , the grounds of appeal being , that conversations between the undercover police officers and the appellant were interviews and , therefore , the rules in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 and the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 ( s. 66 ) Codes of Practice ( ‘ the PACE Codes ’ ) ought to have been but were not observed , that the effect of the police operation had been to trick the appellant and his co-accused into self-incrimination , and that pursuant to Reg. v. Sang [ 1980 ] A.C. 402 the court ought to have excluded the evidence under section 78 of the Act of 1984 . |
| 23 | Her brief had been to visit a number of Northern provincial collections and select works that would fit neatly within her chosen theme . |
| 24 | David 's answer had been to bring the boy before the old man . |
| 25 | The most nerve-racking part in the end had been to locate the site of the graves . |
| 26 | One of Cromer 's first acts had been to abolish the use by government officials of the curbash , the whip , as a means of enforcing obedience . |
| 27 | This was a backward step , since one of the goals of the Ministry had been to increase the proportion of trained teachers through in-service training to upgrade ‘ empirical ’ teachers , as well as by initial teacher training . |
| 28 | And Kaas had soon learnt that part of his duties in the criminal division of the Stasi had been to supply the hierarchy with whatever was needed by way of eroticism and perversion . |
| 29 | The mission had been to penetrate a terrorist base in Libya and eliminate all personnel , which included Salim Al-Makesh , an advisor to the Black June , a movement founded by Abu Nidal in I976 in protest at the involvement of Syria in the Lebanese civil war , and Jean-Jacques Bernard , a senior member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine . |
| 30 | His first experience in magic had been to give a show at the Miners Welfare hall at the age of 11 . |