The National Fire Protection Association® (NFPA®) is a trusted and respected fixture in the lives of safety professionals across the globe. As a self-funded nonprofit, the association strives to help save lives and reduce loss with information, knowledge, and passion.
Today, more than 10,000 volunteers make up the more than 250 technical committees responsible for publishing NFPA codes and standards. Tens of thousands of professionals are part of the vast network of NFPA membership.
But did you know that NFPA began as one small group of insurance professionals seeking to address a challenge related to fire sprinkler installations more than 125 years ago.
A consistent approach to fire sprinkler installations
The story of NFPA began in the late 1800s. It was a time when factories were doing well in the United States, especially in the northeastern cities. Losses, like those from fire, were always a possible danger. Insurance companies were covering the costs of the damage caused by the regular fires.
A drawing of a sprinkler head from 1896. Fire sprinkler systems were becoming more popular in the U.S. during this time. The first American patents for fire sprinkler systems came out in the 1870s. In the following years, more sophisticated designs appeared, and as these designs got better, people started using and testing sprinklers more. But there was a critical problem.
As the technology became more popular, people started installing it everywhere, but they weren’t doing it the same way each time. It was quickly turning into a big problem for plumbers, said Casey Grant, who used to be the executive director of the Fire Protection Research Foundation. He wrote this in an article celebrating the 100th anniversary of the NFPA. “Something needed to change,” he said.
In 1895, several experts in insurance and property protection came together in Boston for the first time to talk about how to deal with this problem. They talked about how, back then, nine different standards for the size and spacing of fire sprinkler pipes were being used within a 100-mile area around Boston. They also mentioned the growing body of evidence and research showing which installation methods were most effective.
The group kept meeting, and after one meeting in March 1896, they released the “Report of Committee on Automatic Sprinkler Protection,” which later became NFPA 13, the Standard for the Installation of Sprinkler Systems. At a later meeting on November 6, 1896, the group decided to create a whole new organization focused on improving fire safety. The approved document said, “This organization will be called the National Fire Protection Association,” and that’s how the NFPA was officially created.
Growth, diversification, and the future
In the early 1900s, the NFPA expanded quickly, with more people and groups joining the organization, and also created more codes and standards. Even though the name includes "National," the NFPA started accepting members from other countries in 1903. In 1904, the rules about joining were updated to let more people and groups in, beyond just those connected to fire insurance.
Like the development of NFPA 13 and the NEC, new dangers and sad incidents kept influencing the range of NFPA standards over time.
For example, after 146 people—mainly young immigrant women—died in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York City in 1911, the NFPA created the NFPA Committee on Safety to Life in 1913. This group eventually became the NFPA 101®, Life Safety Code®. In recent years, big fires like the Ghost Ship warehouse fire in Oakland, California, in 2016, which caused 36 deaths, and the Grenfell Tower fire in London in 2017, which resulted in 72 deaths, helped create the NFPA Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem™.