Sentence:  Would we want a future-day Gibbon or Macaulay recounting the saga of <WSD>America</WSD> with movies as his prime source of knowledge ? 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  North American republic containing 50 states - 48 conterminous states in North America plus Alaska in northwest North America and the Hawaiian Islands in the Pacific Ocean; achieved independence in 1776