Look in your Yellow Pages under "Asbestos testing" - there are places you can send or take a sample, to see what you've got.

There is no way to tell without testing, we are not magicians

Homebound, testing is about the only option to know for sure--it sounds very much like what covered about 1/3 of my basement ceiling when I bought my place in '87. For some reason, it was only on the part which had been near the original furnace, under the living room. Being an ambitious new homeowner, I ripped it down--wearing gloves. There was a lot of sooty dust on top of it, but I didn't notice any fibers from it in the mix.
Some twenty four years on, I'm still alive, with the same cough I've had since I was about 20--accompanied by the occasional throat-clearing--both of which I got from my father.
At the very least, wear a face-mask and gloves, and long-sleeved shirt.

"...magicians" - funny. Just was hoping someone might be familiar with it based on the description. I suspect it's cellulose, not asbestos, but we'll see. Thanks.

If you work on this without finding out if it is asbestos, please invest in a respirator mask, not a painters mask. I scraped my popcorn ceiling and got a bacterial lung infection that turned into pneumonia. Not fun.

homebound-
Asbestos was less common in ceiling tile than vinyl floor tile, but no one can tell even if you gave us photos to examine. Testing is a cheap way to avoid second guessing yourself later.

We were told that our ceiling tiles in the sitting room and the dining room were asbestos. I had them tested for less than 20 bucks and they were cellulous. I pulled them down and found, under several layers of wallpaper, beautiful plaster ceilings. So worth the work.
Diane

we recently tore out a ceiling like this. underneath it was another ceiling almost the same! we tore out that one and found the original plaster. after a lot of patching and skim-coating, the ceiling is easily the best one in the house. now to scrape the popcorn...

Ah, scrapimg popcorn - a karma punishment for misdeeds in a past life.

My daughters buying a house built in 40s. We passed on lead and asbestos testing. Told her we chewed on asbestos and ate lead paint and look how good I turnt out. 🙄

We were tough back then. In the 50s in grade school, we had Civil Defence tests and were sent to the school basement to shelter. The stuff was hanging off the pipes. Ah, good times.