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Quick Comeback. Founded in 1919 by a roughhewn, forceful Dutch flyer named Albert Plesman, KLM inaugurated the world's first scheduled airplane passenger service in 1920 by flying from London to Amsterdam in a chartered de Havilland 16. By World War II it had a fleet of 51 planes, served 61 cities in 29 countries. In a few days Nazi bombers almost completely wiped it out. At war's end KLM had only four planes in Europe, but Plesman (who died in 1953) gathered KLM personnel from all over the world, led "the Flying Dutchman" in a remarkable comeback. Today KLM's 160,000 miles of routes to 124 cities in 74 countries rank it as the world's third airline in international passenger traffic (after Pan American and British Overseas Airways Corp.), the second in international cargo.