While a proposed border wall in the United States dominates news today, historians say it has been a century since a lesser known border closure left many Australians stranded and created chaos along a state line.

Sorry, this audio has expired How the 1918 Spanish flu changed the world

At the end of January 1919 authorities made the drastic decision to suddenly close the New South Wales and Queensland border to stop the spread of the deadly Spanish Flu into the northern state.

"The Spanish Flu was amazing. We just don't realise the scale — it killed 50 million people worldwide," Tweed Regional Museum curator Erika Taylor said.

She said the absolute devastation of the flu led to the decision to quickly close the gate at the border, which caused immediate problems for residents in the border towns of Coolangatta and Tweed Heads.

"They just shut it at 2pm on a day at the end of January," Ms Taylor said.

"Of course we all know Twin Towns is so close, the border is so fluid.

"People were literally stuck. [They] had gone out to see a friend, come back [and] the gate was shut, there [were] … police and they were not letting you through."

On the Queensland side the border closure shut people off from their usual shops and essential services.

"Coolangatta at the time had no school, no post office, not much. No baker, no butcher — all of that was on the Tweed Heads side," Ms Taylor said.

Angry residents hold a public meeting at the closed NSW and Queensland border after it was suddenly closed. ( Supplied: Tweed Regional Museum )

Closure angers locals

Upset residents quickly called an indignation meeting at the border.

"They met on the footbridge and held a very angry meeting with the Quarantine Department asking for people to go through for business purposes and to allow food and mail and goods over," Ms Taylor said.

The Quarantine Department was determined to keep the flu out of Queensland, and only some concessions were made.

"The flu was so bad they said, 'No. Nothing, absolutely no people'," she said.

"You could pass some bread and food over and a bit of goods that could be traded."

A growing problem with the border closure was that people were unable to return home from their summer holidays on the NSW North Coast.

"There was a huge amount of people coming back [to Queensland]," Ms Taylor said.

"It was the end of summer so they were coming back from holidays from Byron, [and] Coffs Harbour … back to Brisbane."

The Queenslanders had to be quarantined before they were allowed to re-enter their home state under police escort.

"They set up a camp in Rainbow Bay where they could go and have a vaccination and they had to wait a week to make sure they weren't showing signs."

Police escort a group of women across the border to be quarantined at Rainbow Bay. ( Supplied: Tweed Regional Museum )

Flu kills thousands of Australians

It is estimated that 15,000 Australians died from the Spanish Flu.

Across the country the National Museum of Australia said Australia had one of the world's lowest death rates from the disease, with 2.7 deaths for every 1,000 people.

However in some Aboriginal communities the mortality rate was as high as 50 per cent.

Ms Taylor said by May 23, 1919 the flu had made its way into Queensland, despite all efforts to block its movement at the border.

"By June you could pass the border with a certificate saying you didn't have the flu, but only one police [was] stationed there, so I am not sure how … well it would have gone holding back hundreds of people trying to cross over," Ms Taylor said.

The exact date of the border's full reopening is not known.

Ms Taylor said the 1919 closure is the only time the NSW and Queensland border has been closed to humans.