the big house
noun
US slang
: a building where people are kept as punishment for a crime : prison
He spent four years in the big house.
Examples of the big house in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
Outside the big house, his body is left on the windshield of the ambulance.
—
Erik Kain, Forbes, 13 Oct. 2024
Barbara, the missing girl, is a scion of the big house.
—Yvonne Zipp, The Christian Science Monitor, 17 Sep. 2024
Season five ended with the dastardly Terry Silver thwarted, but the equally dastardly John Kreese has escaped the big house and is on the lam!
—Abid Rahman, The Hollywood Reporter, 1 July 2024
And the idea of sending an ex-pres to the big house could have a chilling effect on the jury.
—Anita Chabria, Los Angeles Times, 30 May 2024
Erik Kain, Forbes, 13 Oct. 2024
Barbara, the missing girl, is a scion of the big house.
—Yvonne Zipp, The Christian Science Monitor, 17 Sep. 2024
Season five ended with the dastardly Terry Silver thwarted, but the equally dastardly John Kreese has escaped the big house and is on the lam!
—Abid Rahman, The Hollywood Reporter, 1 July 2024
And the idea of sending an ex-pres to the big house could have a chilling effect on the jury.
—Anita Chabria, Los Angeles Times, 30 May 2024
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'the big house.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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“The big house.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/the%20big%20house. Accessed 4 Nov. 2024.
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