After a disastrous series of fires between 1942 and 1946 , including the Cocoanut Grove Nightclub fire in Boston , which claimed the lives of 492 people and the Winecoff Hotel fire in Atlanta which claimed 119 lives , the '' Building Exits Code '' began to be utilized as potential legal legislation . The verbiage of the code , however , was intended for building contractors and not legal statues , so the NFPA decided to re-edit the Code and some revisions appeared in the 1948 , 1949 , 1951 and 1952 publications . The editions published in 1957 , 1958 , 1959 , 1960 , 1961 and 1963 refined the verbiage and presentation even further
Cocoanut Grove Nightclub fire
Cocoanut Grove fire
Life Safety Code