Example sentences of "[prep] [adj] years he [vb past] [vb pp] " in BNC.

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1 For thirty-nine years he had devoted himself to the British public .
2 For some years he had made a practice of writing to government departments about the grievances of seamen , addressing these also to prominent persons and sending copies to the press .
3 After three years he had saved up enough money to travel to Melbourne where he stayed with his uncle .
4 For six years he had remained current by flying a dozen hours a year , mainly on Cessna 150s ; then between 1986 and 1989 he flew only six hours , with his last recorded solo flight in August 1987 and last dual in August 1989 .
5 These past three years he had grown sullen and morose , keeping himself at a distance , always watching her , silently blaming her for Maisie 's tragic death .
6 He lay awake in the big double bed where for sixteen years he had striven desperately to create the heirs to inherit his many rich acres , but there had been no children .
7 For ten years he had lived this lonely life , his heart full of sadness and his head full of dark dreams .
8 A year later he switched to Labour , and within six years he had won a seat on Hounslow borough council .
9 In previous years he had forbidden staff to bring their own booze ‘ so as to avoid making an invidious distinction ’ .
10 There had been a period when he allowed Barbara Castle , Dick Crossman and George Wigg , all of whom suffered from the belief that politics was a conspiracy , to influence him too much , but in later years he had broken free from them and I suddenly realised how much I had got used to him being there to shoulder the final responsibility , to feeling able to turn to him naturally for a second opinion and for well-informed advice .
11 Within three years he had become the most successful muslin manufacturer in Britain .
12 From then on his rise was rapid and within three years he had become the supreme influence at Edward 's court .
13 Within three years he had emigrated to the United States .
14 He had carried the day , of course , for although in fourteen years he had made himself supreme King in Alba , he was born to the north , and from Moray to the northernmost island of Orkney he was the leader men trusted and knew .
15 Within ten years he had conquered the other tribes along the Mad Dog Pass and subjugated the Night Goblin tribes that lived around and under Thunder Mountain .
16 In five years he had turned a struggling side into formidable Championship contenders capable of springing surprises on League giants in the Cup .
17 Within five years he had paid back every penny , and by 1960 his ships were making a good deal of money .
18 In recent years he had stayed only a day or two , until , overcome with boredom , he had returned home to watch Mrs Thatcher 's Leader 's speech on the telly .
19 In recent years he had made a point of appeasing the fundamentalists at the same time as co-opting left-wing opposition .
20 Within two years he had designed and installed electrical repeater devices , indicating to signalmen the position of semaphore signal arms which were outside their range of vision ; an automatic device recording on tape the bell-code communications between signal-boxes ; and the first track circuiting in which the presence of a train on a section of track was indicated electrically in the signal cabin .
21 For one thing , she said , they could hardly scrape up enough money for one deck passage , let alone two , for in two years he had sold only three paintings for a few pounds .
22 Boase explained that for twenty years he had made a collection of notes relating to English persons deceased since 1850 , and that in compiling his work he had kept in mind the dictum of James Anthony Froude [ q.v. ] , ‘ we want the biographies of common people ’ , so that many hundreds of the thousands of entries included in his compilation related to persons who had not been eminent but had led interesting lives , accounts of which could not be found in any other book .
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