Example sentences of "[noun] had [been] a " in BNC.
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| 1 | The first Napoleon had been a patron of men of science , perhaps hoping that finance and political economy might be thus ‘ removed from the sphere of party ’ ; and men like Berthollet , Laplace , Cuvier , Gay-Lussac , Arago , Dumas and Berthelot played prominent parts in , or received titles from , governments of different colours during the century . |
| 2 | Over the years her religion had been a great comfort to her . |
| 3 | Although Northamptonshire had been a stronghold of Puritan sentiment during the Civil War , following the Restoration most of the county adhered to the episcopal church . |
| 4 | Roz Hatch had been a real looker in her time , and the family portrait said one thing to Cowley above all else : we stick together . |
| 5 | In 1990 Johnston and Hatch had been a most feared combination but now the former has returned to his old stamping ground at Bishop Auckland for one final fling before retiring . |
| 6 | Many of those whose names appeared on the lists also complained , arguing that their overdrafts had been a product of the chronic inefficiency of the bank and its slack accounting procedures . |
| 7 | He contacted E. D. Morel , whose Congo Association had been a model of effective agitation ; Normal Angell , the best known public advocate of pacifism ; and Ramsay MacDonald , who had resigned the leadership of the Labour party when it agreed to vote for the war credits . |
| 8 | While at Bradford in 1911 , Mr. Spencer had been a pioneer with trolleybus development and with his permission , the Associated Equipment Company ( another UndergrounD Group subsidiary ) , demonstrated a single deck trolleybus of quite modern appearance for the time , somewhere on the South Metropolitan system during 1922 , presumably with one trolley on the wire and towing a ball and chain . |
| 9 | The social scientist charged with monitoring and evaluating the project ( Goodman 1979 ) refused to answer the question as to whether or not the experiment had been a success , asserting that this was the wrong question . |
| 10 | Simone de Beauvoir was convinced that Nizan 's confrontation with the reality of the Soviet experiment had been a profoundly disorientating experience for him : " Nizan was deeply disturbed to discover that out there , as here , everyone died alone and knew it " , she noted . |
| 11 | Its most common approach through long centuries had been a kind of two-pronged one . |
| 12 | Poland was strategically placed between Russia and Germany , and for centuries had been a bone of contention between them . |
| 13 | Football had been a traditionally rowdy and sometimes violent game , but as a regulated spectator sport it provided novel opportunities for conflicts between the players , referees and fans , and there is a well documented history of pitch invasions , attacks on referees and players , and fighting between rival fans throughout the latter part of the nineteenth century and into the new century . |
| 14 | There was no clear indication of which group had assisted in his escape , with reports attributing a motive variously to the US Drug Enforcement Agency ( DEA ) , the left-wing December 20 ( M-20 ) guerrillas , or the Panamanian Defence Forces ( FDP ) , of which Gaitán had been a commander , and which was believed to have been behind a number of bombings since the US invasion . |
| 15 | At times , it looks like little more than nepotism : The Prince of Wales ' last private secretary , Edward Adeane had been a page-of-honour to the Queen in his teens ; his father , Lord Adeane , had been the Queen 's private secretary for nearly twenty years , and his great-grandfather , Lord Stamfordham had been private secretary to George V. George VI 's private secretary , Sir Alan Lascelles , was a cousin of the sixth Lord Harewood , husband of Princess Mary . |
| 16 | The boys talked nostalgically about the way fighting had been a part of their fathers ' world ; ‘ about the time old man MacIlroy , half-pissed , had taken on ali the men folk of his very extended family , at his sister 's wedding , and stili had time to call for more beer . |
| 17 | The defendant had been a director of plaintiffs for 13 years and had been in charge of the development and sales of a certain type of heater . |
| 18 | Even more important was the fact that people had devoted their lives to establishing the identity of such creatures ; that for someone the original distinction between Porcellio and Armadillidium had been a matter of life-consuming importance . |
| 19 | When Meredith had been a child , her father always read A Christmas Carol aloud to his family on Christmas Eve . |
| 20 | His eyes had been a brand on her flesh , stripping away her clothes , caressing her so that she had felt her heartbeat quickening . |
| 21 | Marie had been a hairdresser before her son Mark was born . |
| 22 | Bluebeard had been a private joke — an exclamation she had been unable to stifle as they 'd rounded the cliff at the head of the valley and she had got her first glimpse of the imposing turreted Castell Rocamar . |
| 23 | The victims were not just the established railway enthusiast tour operators ( all but a handful of which had already been squeezed out ) but organisations such as the women 's institutes and working men 's clubs , whose annual train trips had been a tradition . |
| 24 | It was normal to tear the shawl first so that its value would not tempt a profane person to violate the tomb ; but the shawl had been a beautiful one and he had not been able to bring himself to do that . |
| 25 | As far as she was concerned , the tea had been a success . |
| 26 | Andrew Jean had been a good ‘ pomp , a good gangbuddy . |
| 27 | In ‘ The Decline of the English Murder ’ he argued that whereas in the past murder had been a serious business involving strong personal commitments and emotions , it had now become an almost casual affair informed by ‘ the anonymous life of dance-halls and the false values of the American film ’ . |
| 28 | The murder had been a particularly horrible one , and no one felt sympathetic towards the murderer . |
| 29 | The result had been a succession of balance of payments crises , deflationary countermeasures at home , and consequent interruptions to economic growth . |
| 30 | Many , probably the great majority of the population , were convinced by 1939 if not before that the Jews had been a harmful influence in German society , and that it would be better if those still remaining left ( or were forced to leave ) as soon as possible . |