Variolation, brought to the American colonies in 1721 by Reverend Cotton Mather, February 12, 1663 – February 13, 1728,  and Dr. Zabdiel Bolyston, 1679 – March 2, 1766,  was the technique of placing some live variola matter into an incision to give the patient, hopefully, only a light case of smallpox to protect the patient when a smallpox epidemic hit a community.